spec24 wrote:I have fun with Spore, but I also have fun with Lego's. And while lego's are nothing new, neither is Spore. It's not innovative. It's a hodge-podge of different games slapped together with a common logo/theme, neither one of which is particularly that much fun on its own

That is a common view around here, which I abundantly share. But this is a nicely succinct way of putting it, so I'm just reposting it.

I'll add that Legos almost certainly take more sophistication of thought and teach a child more than this game ever could. With Legos, there is a certain precise, logical way the pieces have to fit together, and if you want to make something coherent and functional you have to learn (on a child's level) some basic principles of construction. The tactile experience of manipulating intricate objects in reality and experimenting with their possibilities is surely more mentally constructive than any of Spore's tools. The Spore editors are more like a blank canvas on which you can scribble any random thing you want and get it to "work." Now, if they had followed through with their original goal and given functional, physical significance to creature design, it would have been both a tremendously more interesting and enjoyable game and a far more mentally engaging, even educational process.

Even that would have been a phenomenally greater achievement than the Spore we got instead. But now think of those Legos that incorporate real robotics and programmable action... I can't think of a better toy around today for a child's mind--second only to the sadly out-of-fashion chemistry sets of old. It is not surprising that so many famous scientists--who have profoundly advanced the human race and improved our lives--attribute their early love of science to their playing with chemistry sets as children.

When you think of the potential of toys like these (certainly not just for children), potential of the sort that Will Wright himself explicitly talked up in the marketing phase, the shrunken aspirations of Spore are made to look even smaller and less excusable.

spec24 wrote:Will's own beliefs (which he happily sold for just a little more)

That really seems uncalled for. "Happily"? How could you know this?

-FrL-

hammarskjold wrote:

spec24 wrote:Will's own beliefs (which he happily sold for just a little more)

That really seems uncalled for. "Happily"? How could you know this?

-FrL-

Actually, we don't; if what we're seeing now is to be believed, he was persuaded by the Cute Spore team...that he gave in is distressing, but we have no indication that he didn't fight hard for REAL Spore before caving.

I'd LIKE to give him the benefit of the doubt...though I would have thought he'd fight for Spore's original vision and win.

rocketgirl wrote:

hammarskjold wrote:

spec24 wrote:Will's own beliefs (which he happily sold for just a little more)

That really seems uncalled for. "Happily"? How could you know this?

-FrL-

Actually, we don't; if what we're seeing now is to be believed, he was persuaded by the Cute Spore team...that he gave in is distressing, but we have no indication that he didn't fight hard for REAL Spore before caving.

I'd LIKE to give him the benefit of the doubt...though I would have thought he'd fight for Spore's original vision and win.

I am not sure Will deserves the benefit of the doubt. At the end of the day, it is his game and Will is still the boss. The buck has to stop some place. I would agree with you if it was a budget issue that it could be an EA problem.

I am giving EA a pass on this one because I really think they left them alone to do what they needed/wanted. This screw up appears to be a Maxis one. Cute won the day and we can expect more of the same from the expansions in my opinion. The game we thought we were getting, the game we have followed for many years will never be. They can add a ocean level but if its more of the same what is the point? Just more fluff and no game is what we will continue to get because I just don't see Maxis at this point going back and making major game changes to the game we have right now.

nykara wrote:

darwintheory wrote:That guys a freakin idiot (not Will he cool). I simply fail to understand why the
cuteness was nesscary. Look at other games (hunting, RPG, FPS) they don't need
cuteness and they sell millions of copies. *sigh* maybe some day they will create
a realistic add-on to make the game look better. Don't get me wrong, I like the current
Spore but that "Cute Man" should be fired as I see him as the reason Spore dissappointed
many, he killed Science Spore!

Yeah but then you need to look at World of Warcraft over a lot of the other MMO's that are out there. It's the *most* popular out of all of them and it is cartoonish. The fact is cute sells. There's also a reason why the alliance side in WoW was always more popular then horde - again because people want cute little gnomes or night elves instead of things that look like Bulls or have huge ugly tusks.

Some people in here have made some very realistic and not-cute designs and other people have made cute designs. My personal tastes is for cute (That's why my favorite animals are things like rabbits and koala's and dogs and cats because they are all cute) the way I see the current set up though is that it caters for all kinds of styles and preferences.

I never have (nor will I) state that cute doesn't sell. However the Cute isn't the main problem, the problem is that instead of focusing on making a great game they scraped alot of great ideas just to make it more cute. If it was cute and yet had ONE scientific process it would be so much better. It's your right to make cute things, and I don't hate cute things, I just wish instead of that guy fighting to make Dissapoint Spore he would of let Will's Spore come to life. I like Spore and I won't stop playing it for a while, and maybe I'll get Will's Spore by the time I turn 50
I knew that Spore was dissapoint when I first saw it I just hoped it wouldn't.

I hate WoW don't know why I guess playing a game with a bunch of immature teens isn't my bag.

Splego.

Lets sum it up real easy.

They wanted to make an "Epic" game for "Casual" gamers.

Just that sentence explains a lot. And Will said it numerous times, he wanted to make this game for The Sims players in mind. So in there we see a huge problem, for any game with epic scope implies a lot of content, and then spore wanted several stages, so that implied even more elements. So for someone thats used to manage a few sims with basic needs, you can't expect anything close to the scope or complexity of Master Of Orion type of games. It wouldn't fit the target audience.

I'm just a little baffled on how Will flaunted how much focus there would be to science knowing full well that everything would have to be "simplified" so that a casual The Sims player wouldn't feel overwhelmed. It's this contradiction that made Spore what it is today.

And please note, who is complaining? The hardcore gamers. Or people that were expecting greater complexity, more in depth diplomacy, trading. If it's not "Casual The Sims player friendly", we couldn't expect for it to be in the game. ALTOUGH, I totally feel people were lead on a bit by the numerous videos of a more complex game. Many things Will said in those videos, those things were never adresed as launch came to happen.

For laughs, please view the civilization developper video that was realesed a few days before Spore Launch. First, I like when one of the Software Engineers Soren Johnson says "One of the big features of uhh... civ is that it has a vv... fairly deep diplomacy model" LOL, did he realize as he was saying it that he was stretching the truth a bit. Then the other guy says "What I like to do, is play with the cities, and the citizens inside the cities." ... REALLY, what do you do exactly with the citizens? Ok, at the space stage you could zap em, or wtv, but you can't even intereact with citizens at the civ stage. What is he talking about? And again, Soren, says this "If you fight alongside another civ during the civ stage, they will be able to go with you to the next stage......." It's all your creature as the opozing nations anyway at this point. I would of been fun for them to allow other creatures to ascend to civ as in the tribal stage. Anyways.

Enough said.

spongb6f1 wrote:

spec24 wrote:I have fun with Spore, but I also have fun with Lego's. And while lego's are nothing new, neither is Spore. It's not innovative. It's a hodge-podge of different games slapped together with a common logo/theme, neither one of which is particularly that much fun on its own

That is a common view around here, which I abundantly share. But this is a nicely succinct way of putting it, so I'm just reposting it.

I'll add that Legos almost certainly take more sophistication of thought and teach a child more than this game ever could. With Legos, there is a certain precise, logical way the pieces have to fit together, and if you want to make something coherent and functional you have to learn (on a child's level) some basic principles of construction. The tactile experience of manipulating intricate objects in reality and experimenting with their possibilities is surely more mentally constructive than any of Spore's tools. The Spore editors are more like a blank canvas on which you can scribble any random thing you want and get it to "work." Now, if they had followed through with their original goal and given functional, physical significance to creature design, it would have been both a tremendously more interesting and enjoyable game and a far more mentally engaging, even educational process.

Even that would have been a phenomenally greater achievement than the Spore we got instead. But now think of those Legos that incorporate real robotics and programmable action... I can't think of a better toy around today for a child's mind--second only to the sadly out-of-fashion chemistry sets of old. It is not surprising that so many famous scientists--who have profoundly advanced the human race and improved our lives--attribute their early love of science to their playing with chemistry sets as children.

When you think of the potential of toys like these (certainly not just for children), potential of the sort that Will Wright himself explicitly talked up in the marketing phase, the shrunken aspirations of Spore are made to look even smaller and less excusable.

Speaking of Lego's I'm playing Lego Batman.

If you want to see how making something simple doesn't mean you have to make it suck people should check it out . It's nothing groundbreaking but its the sort of time kill that I like. It's also only 40 dollars .

hmmm

vhorthex wrote:Lets sum it up real easy.

For laughs, please view the civilization developper video that was realesed a few days before Spore Launch. First, I like when one of the Software Engineers Soren Johnson says "One of the big features of uhh... civ is that it has a vv... fairly deep diplomacy model" LOL, did he realize as he was saying it that he was stretching the truth a bit. Then the other guy says "What I like to do, is play with the cities, and the citizens inside the cities." ... REALLY, what do you do exactly with the citizens? Ok, at the space stage you could zap em, or wtv, but you can't even intereact with citizens at the civ stage. What is he talking about? And again, Soren, says this "If you fight alongside another civ during the civ stage, they will be able to go with you to the next stage......." It's all your creature as the opozing nations anyway at this point. I would of been fun for them to allow other creatures to ascend to civ as in the tribal stage. Anyways.

Enough said.

Yeah, I remember that video!

What the aychee doublell were they talking about? It's as though they're talking about a completely different game.

Is there an actual decent civ game hiding somewhere in the Maxis office, that they shelved in order to release the piece of silliness that we actually got?

-FrL-

tokeymcbongrip wrote:

Nykara wrote:
Yeah but then you need to look at World of Warcraft over a lot of the other MMO's that are out there. It's the *most* popular out of all of them and it is cartoonish. The fact is cute sells. There's also a reason why the alliance side in WoW was always more popular then horde - again because people want cute little gnomes or night elves instead of things that look like Bulls or have huge ugly tusks.

Some people in here have made some very realistic and not-cute designs and other people have made cute designs. My personal tastes is for cute (That's why my favorite animals are things like rabbits and koala's and dogs and cats because they are all cute) the way I see the current set up though is that it caters for all kinds of styles and preferences.

hey now im straight up horde DOWN WITH THE ALLIANCE!! i have not a single alliance character in wow lol, looks like its time to reactivate my account now that im bored with spore, i was hoping spore would help my wallet a bit by keeping me from wow for a while but looks like thats not gonna happen lol

I just wanted to remind everyone about this:

I think people might be thinking wrong. It is not necessarily ugly graphics vs cute graphics. I think it is intelligence vs cute. Which is to say something an adult SHOULD enjoy, if they like thinking as opposed to being a zombie, or a 5 year old kid would enjoy, which they DO but I am not a 5 year old.

Also, things tend to advance if the selection favors advancement (like evolution). If we keep settling for non-intellectual, low quality wares then that is what will be developed.

I have an example of this about 6 years ago. I went to Korea one of the years and was thinking it doesn't compare to the US except for the cell phone (and maybe some other technologies). They had movie phones (phones that played entire movies) and video phones at a time when all we had were camera-phones (and for CHEAPER than American phones!). Why? Probably many reasons, but one I'd like to think because so many of the American population were amazed at just camera phones and didn't really demand anything better. So keep demanding we want lower qualities games and maybe we will see what happens down the line. I don't know the future.

aznparker wrote:
I have an example of this about 6 years ago. I went to Korea one of the years and was thinking it doesn't compare to the US except for the cell phone (and maybe some other technologies). They had movie phones (phones that played entire movies) and video phones at a time when all we had were camera-phones (and for CHEAPER than American phones!). Why? Probably many reasons, but one I'd like to think because so many of the American population were amazed at just camera phones and didn't really demand anything better. So keep demanding we want lower qualities games and maybe we will see what happens down the line. I don't know the future.

That and the fact that a lot of these products are made over there
But its true, why give them oranges if they will setle for lemons?
It is a capitalist world and the economists are have a field day.
But dont forget that just the majorety of the consumers are not educated on the fact that they influence as to whats being sold to them. Grab them by the wallet if you want something done these days.

Just to add some more spice,

I love how in this article they tackle the procedural creature creation. Rather than simply add tutorials explaining the functions of the creator, like explaining all if any consequence on your creature. Like for the 5 leg example. Once you add the 5th leg, the "speed" indicator on the stats bar could change to red and have a tool tip "Too many legs impair movement". Or "Sections of body are too heavy making the creature move slower". Wtv, i'm not saying this messages are pure gold and explain the entire problematic. But I think some of you will see what i'm getting at.

And anyways, What they said about the fact that having procedural creature creation would limit the creativity of people. In the sense that oh I can't make an 8 legged creature that runs super fast, how is that fixed in the current creature creator? Since parts are linked to wtv "attack/activity" the player is forced to chose these pieces to have a succesful creature. As much as putting no eyes makes the game harder to play, in what is that different than making an unbalanced creature and not having it funciton in an "optimal way".

And if anything, wouldn't of the procedural creature creation actually make people think when they create? In the sense of you make this funny looking creature. But when you start using it you realize that certain tweaks need to be made. And this approach would lead to discoveries of optimal placements or funny/bad results.

See in this field, the "simplyfing" of creature creation actually makes me less inclined to design anything special for, you just slap on the lvl 5 mouth and the level 5 feet, and the creature is fine. So theres no incentive of creative thinking as far as for impact on gameplay.

I got my girlfriend to sit down for a few hours to play Spore today. Being a non-gamer she got from Cell to Tribe with my help. So far she's had the most fun in the Cell stage.

Then she turned to me and we had a conversation like this:

her: "So... if I put more eyes on my cell, he can see other creatures better?"
me: "No. Putting more eyes on it doesn't matter."
her: "Really? It seemed like the bigger creatures with spikes and a dozen eyes found me a lot easier."
me: "Actually, adding a dozen eyes is the same thing as having one eye, and it doesn't matter where you put them."
her: "Oh."

I'll add, the "Oh" being expressed with disappointment. Excitement was building because Spore was almost suggesting that her changes (like the eyes) made a difference in the game world, but it did not.

I guess someone could counter-argue that placing spikes versus spit parts does make a difference. However I think these decisions never map consistently to consequences.

mflux wrote:I got my girlfriend to sit down for a few hours to play Spore today. Being a non-gamer she got from Cell to Tribe with my help. So far she's had the most fun in the Cell stage.

Then she turned to me and we had a conversation like this:

her: "So... if I put more eyes on my cell, he can see other creatures better?"
me: "No. Putting more eyes on it doesn't matter."
her: "Really? It seemed like the bigger creatures with spikes and a dozen eyes found me a lot easier."
me: "Actually, adding a dozen eyes is the same thing as having one eye, and it doesn't matter where you put them."
her: "Oh."

I'll add, the "Oh" being expressed with disappointment. Excitement was building because Spore was almost suggesting that her changes (like the eyes) made a difference in the game world, but it did not.

I guess someone could counter-argue that placing spikes versus spit parts does make a difference. However I think these decisions never map consistently to consequences.

Not that this is still related to the OP. But I think you are right that this is something that will have to be adressed by Maxis/EA.