Excellent points mflux.
The tale of Spore is a sad one indeed.

mflux wrote:Glaring flaws in the rest of the game
Some things that have been posted elsewhere, but I've also experienced.

Many of the games objectives are actually chores. This recalls some of the worst design-choices from *bad word* Sims Online. It's ironic that MMO-style grinding somehow showed up in a single player game. "Your quest is to kill 5 creatures over that hill right there." This doesn't seem to get any better in space "Your quest is to kill 5 infected creatures over that hill right there."

This is my biggest gripe with this game.
I hate grinding.

where is the cheese.... i want out of this *spore*ing virtual hampster wheel.

renlar wrote:It doesn't matter if you believe him or not. The posts were excellent points on gameplay, as well as being well thought out. Personally i found that very interesting concepts for the game were dropped for whatever reason, and i was disappointed in the execution of the original concept.

I agree - though I fully believe him.

The point I agree with most is the lack of being able to created pre-configured colonies. Having to drag eight turrets every single time then the same pattern of buildings again and again is just killing me. What is most bizarre is that they were testing this game for YEARS. Did no one play Space stage long enough to get a sense of how excruciatingly repetitive (but often necessary) this process is?

I can live with the repetitive quests: no game can have infinite variety, and the Badges and Collections giving visiting any planet some kind of constructive, useful role.

Generally I am very impressed with Spore though, and love playing it.

I prefer that version of Spore the OP mentioned more......

mflux wrote:Planet to Planet wars - Currently the game does not allow two types of sentient life in one Star System. Why? This seems like a really artificially imposed limit. There's no UI / gameplay reason I can possibly think of that would require this limit. Having wars fought from planet to planet (two planets home to two space-faring species) is a staple of science fiction (War of the Worlds), and it allows some early introduction of alien races, early space flight and battle (instead of inspecting some random artifact), and produces some cool dynamic.

You say this and you seem to be implying they had you working on UI... But from an actual UI person I can think of one very good reason why you don't want multiple races in one system: Systems are marked by who owns them in the star map. Marking shared ownership would be confusing, and overwhelming.

I'm really starting to think I'm the only one who enjoys spore as is right now.

mflux wrotelanet to Planet wars - Currently the game does not allow two types of sentient life in one Star System. Why? This seems like a really artificially imposed limit. There's no UI / gameplay reason I can possibly think of that would require this limit. Having wars fought from planet to planet (two planets home to two space-faring species) is a staple of science fiction (War of the Worlds), and it allows some early introduction of alien races, early space flight and battle (instead of inspecting some random artifact), and produces some cool dynamic.



You say this and you seem to be implying they had you working on UI... But from an actual UI person I can think of one very good reason why you don't want multiple races in one system: Systems are marked by who owns them in the star map. Marking shared ownership would be confusing, and overwhelming.

I respectfully disagree with you, though. Seeing a collection of spices from galaxy view was easy enough. Given that there aren't more than a handful of planets (1-5 colonizable planets at most from what I saw).

What's more problematic than that UI design is actually the fact that there are no race names when hovering over a system. The UI declares the system name and names for all the planets, but gives a tiny, unreadable icon for that race (I'm on a 30" monitor and I still can't see it!). This makes finding and locating a particular race an unnecessary challenge.

Speaking of UI design careers, currently I'm working as a creative director for a UI prototyping company. I know, I probably sound snobby, but you wanted to assert that you're an "actual UI person" I'm a UI person, too. Go us!

jackuul wrote:Never cross the streams? Haven't we all learned that by now? Only cross when threatened by Gozer.

ROFL!!!!!!!!!!!

Mfux, as someone who worked on the game, can you confirm or deny the claims that whole EPs (at least 3 by some accounts) of content are hidden in the game coding so EA can get more money from selling EPs that do little more than unlock hidden content? I'm not so sure about most of those claims, but I'm certain that what I'm seeing in game does not account for 4 GB.

3rdtype wrote:I'm really starting to think I'm the only one who enjoys spore as is right now.

No I do! I can see why other hardcore gamers would want more, but I bought Spore, knowing what I was getting. I wanted a family friendly sandbox. I watched RECENT trailors, trialed the creature creator and THIS Spore was what I was expecting.
And I tend to call myself a hardcore gamer ( I have played ALOT of games on several consoles and the PC for over 25 years), but REAL hardcore gamers would not consider me so, due to the games I enjoy playing.
But again, although I like it the way it is now. I could not even imagine what it takes for developers to make all this happen on my PC, so I rarely complain about things I know nothing about. But it seems original poster knows his stuff and all of his suggestions sound like GOOD ones.

And

jackuul wrote:
Never cross the streams? Haven't we all learned that by now? Only cross when threatened by Gozer.

GOOD STUFF!

I can't (confirm or deny, even if I did I'm not EA/Maxis). I worked so long ago on this, talk of expansion was not very much talked about. We're talking 2004 here... almost five years ago D:

worldbreaker276 wrote:


Mfux, as someone who worked on the game, can you confirm or deny the claims that whole EPs (at least 3 by some accounts) of content are hidden in the game coding so EA can get more money from selling EPs that do little more than unlock hidden content? I'm not so sure about most of those claims, but I'm certain that what I'm seeing in game does not account for 4 GB.

I'll deny it for him. There's about 4GB of content in spore, for sure. Think about it, planet scripts for 500,000 stars worth of planets. Creature data is just a few kb, and I'm sure planets scripts are around the same but scale that up to over 1000000 planets and it's more than 1GB right there, just to generate planets.
Spore is a huge game.

mflux wrote:I can't (confirm or deny, even if I did I'm not EA/Maxis). I worked so long ago on this, talk of expansion was not very much talked about. We're talking 2004 here... almost five years ago D:

Well now you are telling your age, be careful KIDDING Anyway, yes this game has been being worked on for so long. Any input you had on it, and all the other developers, I appreciate. I like the game, but LOVE your suggestions

k look. he stated his claim and opinion on the game, which has very good points. (if he did in fact worked with Maxis, more props to him) however we cant be asking him alot of questions on the project or anything(esp. on Maxiz site), because the forum thread might be closed and even though he doesnt work there anymore he can still be brought up on charges for leaking something (they will toast you on those contracts bro). plus so far he's given general knowledge that everyone had already known or already publicly release from other officals, maybe a little more in depth but still. reason i say this is because my buddy and his dad even still with oblivion being release and everything cant tell certain things here and there. tho it was cool seeing him put together the 3d renders of the minotaur, that was awsome. and it sucks because all he can say about fallout right now is that is awsome and it worth.