Sims' creator's latest project - Spores

BBC Link

My god this sounds cool. Start with amoeba’s and influence their evolution into an inter stellar race. Supposedly out in 2006.

I’m trying not to get hyped up too much, but I am excited about this game. I first learned about it a couple of days ago, which is ironic as I had recently been thinking how lovely it would be to have a game based on the evolution of an organism. The closest thing I know of is E.V.O on the Super Nintendo, which is a fun little game but a very far cry from the depth that Spores seems to be taking.

This looks like it could be a lot of fun. I loved SimEarth and SimLife, and have been hoping Wil Wright (I can’t beleive BBC mispelled his name) would make an update.

I’m just hoping this doesn’t turn out to be another Black & White - lots of hype, very clever and original idea, amazingly complex and interactive world engine … yet not actually fun as a game once the novelty wears off.

Is it going to be multiplayer only? Maybe I misunderstood the article.

No, but yes.

We’ve had a thread about this before. The basic game will be a single player game. However, the multiplayer aspect of it allows your game’s content to be built up by all the creations and creatures of everyone else playing the game. When your species finally gets off its planet, they might run into a species based on a game I played.

I remember seeing someone here point that out a month or so back, and I think it looks very cool. Even playing the Sim titles as a kid, I remember thinking it’d be fun to do the evolution thing in SimEarth, then be able to play them in my SimCity game.

Ah, here’s the post I was thinking about, including links to sites with screenshots. Although it looks like one site got asked by Maxis to take the shots down. But any game that lets you design Evil Care Bears must go onto my wishlist. :slight_smile:

liirogue, the way I read it is that it’ll be “asynchronous, non-competitive multiplayer”. Basically, the critters you come up with in your game can get uploaded to Maxis’s site, and when other players need “seeds” for other planets, your stuff gets downloaded. No direct contact, but your “children” will be the environment for other players. Although I’d assume that this wouldn’t be required to play on a non-networked machine.

Thanks for explaining that, guys. The post sciguy linked to really helped explain the whole concept, too.

I hope he can pull it off - it sounds very very interesting.

Interesting, yes - what a fascinating concept. But I have to express my distress in that it sounds much less open-ended than most of his games. That’s what I love most (especially with SimCity) - much less scripted than most games.

“I’m more of an Intensive Care Bear.”

Sounds very cool. I love fiddling with those artificial life toys and suchlike.

Oh wow. Can I pre-order yet??

I will be lost in that game for months when I first get it.

Will they have to put an “evolution is just a theory” sticker on it in Kansas?

Wil Wright has a pretty solid track record of delivering. Note that Spore wasn’t even announced until there was already a pretty complete engine and graphics in place.

This is a far cry from Peter “Black and White” Molyneux who is the biggest example of hyping and then never delivering, I don’t think he’s released a game since Populous that wasn’t a hell of a lot more fun on paper.

Reproducing by binary fission? Does this mean you’ll have to hit on yourself?

How *me[/me] doin ?

But then I would have to reject myself because I can’t code.