Saturday, September 13, 2008

And futherspore...

Giant Bomb's Brad Shoemaker sums up Spore.

Beyond that, I wanted to address the past, present, and future of this milestone game. Not to be confused with milestone gameplay.

I believe a lot of people auto-hyped Spore beyond Will Wright's suggested experience. That being said, Spore is definitely missing out on some really cool things that Wright himself mentioned. (I'll address those a bit later.)

Generally, my abilities of recollection tend to fail me. I'm pretty sure, however, that Spore has always intended to be more in the casual vein of games than anything else. Quite honestly, that's a very good thing. Spore is the type of game that makes non-gamers curious - if not outright addicted. It's a gateway drug - it even sounds like a drug.

"Hey. Buddy. Need a hit? I got Dyne, Jet, and this nice shiny ounce of Spore..."

Pardon me while I itch my forearms.

I have to admit this whole DRMgate has me worried. I haven't experienced anything happen with my own copy of Spore, but I really wish that Spore wasn't bundled with Fear. I didn't know about the DRM when I purchased Spore, but if I did, I would have been a little more hesitant. I guess they're lucky that the DRM hasn't destroyed my machine yet - if it had, I would have urged my group of friends not to buy the game. So that would have been ~$200 that EA would be out, for screwing me.

As for the future of the game, well, I summed it up nicely at Brainy Gamer. At least I think I did, but I'm biased. Spore is like Mona Lisa's Face. It's pretty, and important in its own right, but the most important part of the painting is still an empty canvas. For those of you unaware, the Mona Lisa is so important because of the perspective the viewer has with the background.

Completing the analogy, the best of Spore has yet to come. The marine expansion, for instance, which Wright wanted to be released with Spore anyway. Underwater cities, I hope, I hope! Anyway, as Spore evolves, so will the experience and its own importance. The game is very much set to reflect back upon the world as much as the world puts into it, and as much as EA allows the world to do.

Lastly, check out my Lovecraftian Glance sporecast, if you have it. I think I'm going to start doing a weekly comic involving the Omegaraptor Empire's abyssal journeys. Need to get all the tools, first. I may or may not be planning on having a giant shoggoth attack a city. Though, that would be an excellently vague videocapture for a machinima newscast.

Possibilities are nigh endless.

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