I'm still enjoying Spore still to this day, and having played through it on several occasions and spent many hours in the editors, I've compiled this comprehensive wishlist of enhancements to the game I feel will make it a more enjoyable experience for many. It's likely many of these may have been suggested before, and I apologize for the redundancy if that's the case.

Sporepedia
a1) I'd like to get out of the habit of checking the website for comments, which only come through on rare occasions for me. This can be done with an option to receive automatic emails for each comment added. The option can be turned off should a user not desire the email spam.

a2) A scrolling Event list would be helpful. Right now we only see the 6 latest events, and these are quickly shuffled when your game experiences notable events (buddy actions, creature action, etc). Perhaps extend this to top 20 with a scrollbar.

a3) Right now, when a person adds me as a buddy I receive no notification except an output to the events panel. If these messages are shuffled off the screen I'll have no way of knowing who requested me as a buddy, and no opportunity to reciprocate. Consider moving all friend requests to a separate friends tab, with an indication of those users who requested my friendship and the action to confirm or respond.


Editors
b1) While playing through the game, each creature or evolution automatically gets uploaded to Sporepedia and your Spore page. Give the user control over what gets uploaded. Oftentimes I have to go back and manually delete all the creations I'm not proud of.

b2) More control over the placement of parts. Holding down the SHIFT key will anchor a part to the X and Y-axis, while the CTRL key toggles movement along the z-axis (depth).

b3) Allow for asymmetry. Pressing a designated key when placing a part will delete its mirrored counterpart.

b4) I'd LOVE to have the flora editor enabled, with user-created plants and trees populating my world.

b5) Furthermore, a planet editor would be magnificent!! Allow the user to place the red dot on the terraforming dial, with the position dictating what parts are available based on a planets makeup (lava beds for hot, ice sculptures for cold, tornadoes for high atmosphere, etc). This would be a much welcomed addition, and perhaps can only become available to those who've beat the game once through on space stage.

b6) Can more control handles be added to parts, much in the same way that pressing the TAB key grants the user? Perhaps pressing a designated key gives a variety of dragging handles throughout the piece allowing for targeted stretching and skewing. A rectangle, for example, can be made into a parallelogram. This would lead to infinite varity in the editors.


Cell
c1) This is the only stage where user content is not downloaded. I can understand this presenting a balance concern. Seeing as how cell's are created for maximum efficiency, having your game seeded with human creations might make it too challenging to play through. Should that be the case, consider only one user downloaded cell per segment of the cell stage...based on complexity. This way each time a user plays through cell stage it's a dynamic experience for them.

c2) Extend the editor to include those missing parts, allowing for more variety and aesthetic differences.

c3) More color palettes, specifically designed to show inner parts and organs when the cell is translucent.


Creature
d1) Sometimes a part can be added that provides the right aesthetics for the creature you envision, but is antiquated by a later obtained part with better stats almost forcing you to upgrade for maximum success. Let the user randomly obtain a part enhancer, which augments the abilities of any part applied to your creature.

d2) Give greater rewards for killing rogues and epics. Perhaps the aforementioned upgrade part could be earned from killing a rogue, or a generous boost in DNA is awarded. A low-grade and high-grade upgrade part could drop from rogues and epics, respectively.

d3) In cell stage, hovering over certain cells reveal the part that will be awarded to you for defeating them. Have you considered doing this for alpha males in the creature stage? This would empower the user to seek the exact parts they're looking for as efficiently as possible. Bone piles will still produce random parts.

d4) Sprinkle random artifacts throughout the world which can be discovered as a creature, and made available on your home planet in space stage for a moderate boost in money.


Tribal
e1) Consider adding wood as a secondary resource needed for building construction.

e2) More team dynamics and social communication between tribes to add distinction and personality.

e3) Allow for construction of one weak defensive building that takes up a building slot. This way a player isn't as afraid to venture far from his hut.

d4) Parts can be discovered throughout the world that can be used in a future colony decoration editor (see below). These are located much in the same way that a creature digs parts out of bone, only they're retrieved from trees, the shores, or random placement throughout the map. Make it so that certain larger parts need to be carried by more than one tribe member for strategic purposes.


Civilization
f1) I take special care when creating an anthem and love hearing it as I lay out my colonies. Unfortunately, any anthem is reset to the first note after each building is placed. Can this song play consistently throughout? This bug also extends into space stage.

f2) Can we regulate the tempo of an underlying anthem beat?

f3) Right now colony decorations are useless and a complete waste of time and money. Allowing users to create decorations would greatly enhance this component of the game and encourage users to add them. Attach these to Sporepedia for even more creative potential. Parts can be located from the tribal phase to invite users to explore the map.


Space
g1) More detailed info on a planets card in Sporepedia, such as T-level, spice color, and ruling empire. When I'm in the center of the galaxy fighting the Grox and receive a warning that Planet X is suffering from an eco-disaster, it would be helpful if I can determine at-a-glance if this is in regards to my T3 purple planet, or a T1 planet of an ally that I care little of. This way I can quickly gauge the threat level and decide if the long trip back home is necessary.

g2) More storybook planets and artifacts to be discovered. Smaller sets to encourage set completion (i.e. part 1 of 5), and a greater reward for this.

g3) The ability to define default buildings in your building panel when laying out a colony. It's incredibly tedious to have to select these from Sporepedia with each new planet you intent to colonize.

g4) I've LOVE more parts for the UFO editor, specifically weapons. This is by far my favorite editor in the game, and can keep me entertained for hours.

g5) Creature sizer retains your change you make. In my experience this creature is removed the moment you leave the atmosphere, and so I have no desire to ever use this tool again.

g6) More random scenarios revolving around sentient creature abduction and mixture. Right now there's little to do with an abducted citizen, except fulfilling the occasional mission.

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In conclusion, I think Spore is a great game but has only scratched the surface with its potential. I understand that Maxis is out to make money like any other company, and that releasing multiple expansion packs seems to be the credence of the company. But PLEASE consider the occasional free content updates or game play improvement for us loyal customers who have bought the game and legitimately subscribed to EA's download manager. It is us that stick with you when a game fails to meet potential or is stricken with patch problems. It is us who are on the forums providing help to other users or suggesting feedback and improvements. And it is us who will be quick to buy future EA/Maxis games instead of pirating them for a lack of depth.

Thanks for reading, and I invite any feedback you may have.

massive amounts of support and agreement to your list!

although your changes are a bit extensive and might be more suitable for an expansion than a patch, i would happily buy any expansion which featured them

moach wrote:massive amounts of support and agreement to your list!

although your changes are a bit extensive and might be more suitable for an expansion than a patch, i would happily buy any expansion which featured them

Thank you moach.

I understand that many of these could warrant an expansion which is expected from them. One thing they could consider would be to linking some of these enhancements as achievement unlocks (unlock 50 achievements, get the flora editor). This is a harmless way to introduce new content without a payment model, and it rewards players who progress through the game in unique and challenges ways to earn an achievement.

I agree with the creature stage stats and parts. I have my suggestion on fixing it since the creature stats do have an effect in the tribal stage.

My suggestion for all stats:

A) Keep max stat at 5
- The max of 5 is fine.

B) No single item can max the stat
- The hideous monster should not have a charm of 5 by just one object. A legless creature should never have a charge of 5 by equipping a good set of horns. Having ears can improve singing and having noses may improve charm. Legs help feet in speed, and arms help claws in strike. The brain level could give a boost to skill because an intelligent creature can make a rhythm in singing, unique poses, more accurate strikes, and etc.

C) Each stat on an item is maxed to 2
- This will allow more options for creatures that enter the tribal stage by not limiting to stats with 4 or 5.

D) More Attack options
- There are more types of attacks other than bite, strike, charge, and spit poison that wild creatures exhibit. An idea to implement more attacks while keeping balance is have a set of attacks assigned to each button and only the strongest attack will work for that button. For example, the Electric Sting and Spit Poison are both button 4 options, and only the stronger ability can the creature use. Certain animals can wrestle and grapple as an attack. This will greatly help herbivores in being defensive.

E) Vocal tones
- One way to customize a creature is tinkering with a vocal tone. Instead of being limited to the single voice that each mouth has, give each mouth a range option to change the tone in different ways. Maybe my creature should meow more so than bark.

On the idea of rogues and epics, there should be no reward for killing an epic in the creature stage beyond the achievement. Epic creatures are only killable in the the creature stage if your creature has bite, strike, and speed maxed and a good escape ability, like flying. This limits out anyone playing with a gentle or extremely social creature, unless they temporarily evolve into a predator for one kill and go back, which I feel breaks the spirit of the game. Although, being able to appease an epic creature in creature stage would warrant a reward for either killing or befriending it.

For the planet editor, I think that making a planet should not be an option, but controlling the image of a planet can be. It would be nice if you can choose the starting water, rock, grass, and atmosphere color of your creature's planet and the quantity of grass to bare rock or ground ratio. Otherwise, you should play in Space stage and control your immediate area of the galaxy and tinker with planets, somewhat of a spectator/god mode, where your creatures are genetically creating life on a planet, instead of transplanting. In Space Stage, you should have a series of terraforming tactics at your disposal.

Bumping this.

I totally agree with the OP and other changes suggested thus far.

Personally, I would enjoy all that and a diplomacy system in space, since I'm sick of my allies being useless star-hogs. Maybe some multi-tasking capability in that stage as well, where you can send allied ships off to do certain tasks to reduce the monotony of collecting spice for money or answering distress calls.

I've always loved SimCity, and I don't think it would hurt to have a system akin to that to replace the dull cut n paste colonization method. Really, it would make each planet more important and increase the usefulness of the social tools.

I could go on, but I'd like to think the creators of SPORE know what they're doing.

I'd like to think that, but I somehow know it's not true...

i totally agree with you,we'd like to see more dealing with the later three stages and sporpiedia.but there IS a flora editor just look up how on you tube or (coming soon) i am making a forum that lists: HOW TOs on how to do things like make a fish that actualy swims (thats NOT on you tube that is somthing i found.) i also have a new idea, what if in the creature stage we needed to drink water or (if a creepy monster) blood like a vampire.now that would make killing an epic hard. but you could get a cammel like hump or somthing to store water in.just somthing like that because it kinnda makes me mad that they don't make you drink in the creature stage but while in the space stage you see the little guys bening in to the ocean.OH another thing,LET US BE FISH!!!!!!!or at least be able to kill the ocean beast(which sould vary from planet to planet but dosn't!)

with the abductions in the creature stage i think you should be able to be abducted and if smart enough (like lvl 3 brain or so) be able to escape, but if not smart enough you are moved to a differant planet which would rise up with the same things as you but thaen if you meet tou realise what happened and join up keeping both(or more probably up to three) planets. also speaking of brain lvl i think you should be able to have more pack members and more brain lvls because that was the big thing about spore for me, making your own critter and making his decisions(you only do this for cell wich was ok, creature wich should be longer, and space wich we should be able to make planets.i think we sould be able to control the vehicles in the sense of like in the creature stage acept you switch between the three(confused?)What i mean is if i am my agronaciens and i use my boat and get radioed that there is an epic attacking a nearby city i would switch to my helicopter and call in the strike team and help take it down.or if my tribe is out hunting i would like to throw my spear or swing my mighty stone axe like Will.
another little improvment(also known to maxis and EA as money) is if i am staying in the tribal stage a loooong time i should see some cities, life diddn't evolve all at once. it spread out like a stench until it filled the room.
I guess what i'm saying is SPORE is amazing but with all of these great ideas we've said here it would beTHE BEST SANDBOX GAME MADE FOR THE PC EVER not to mention you'd show that GameStop's moto means somthing we the players wanted to help in the change of an awsome game to make it even better.

if you've gotten this far you've either scrolled down to finish this post or actualy give a crap about improving our gaming expeirience.
thanks, Mavrick145

Very, very nice work! I agree with everything here, especially the planet editor. Also, I have a few ideas...

-In spaceship editor I would like more dynamics, i.e: being able to actually see the jets you added, instead of just the basic circle-jet line behind you when you move in your spaceship.(maybe this is fixed with higher quality setting...?)
-More tribe member slots available i.e: more army-like proportions, so I don't have to lose too many members taking on a really strong tribe.
-Realistic black holes i.e: other planets give them a wide berth, suggesting that any planets near the black hole were sucked in. Also, if you get too close you could be sucked in and stuck, and maybe have to press something to get out...although this probably would be more of a nuisance to players...

and i completely support all of the ideas in this thread! very nice indeed

There are like, a billion threads concerning this. Post there.

A well organized and thought out list of suggestions.
I support the suggestions made in this list.

I would suggest that you link other Threads that relate to your ideas.
As for me, I am going to link this Thread to my current one on Asymmetry.

Considering how many of these threads there are, I think if you want to avoid getting them forgotten chuck some of your suggestions into this thread: http://forum.spore.com/jforum/posts/list/17843.page. SpydrE, who started the thread, is very supportive and will eventually add your ideas into the main post.