Spore Editor Available June 17th 119
Dr. Eggman writes "Ars Technica heralds the coming of the creature editor for the highly anticipated Spore. A previously promised downloadable demo of the creature editor from the game, due on September 7th, will be available June 17th. Furthermore, a full version of the creature editor will appear as a standalone product at the same time for $10. According to EA: 'The demo lets players shape, paint and play with an unlimited number of creatures, using 25 percent of the creature-making parts from Spore. Gamers can then share these creations with their friends, including seamless uploads to YouTube.'"
fisher-price creatures? (Score:3, Interesting)
Like many here, I have been waiting and watching all of the endless demonstrations of this game, because it really caught my attention. However, my interest is waning with each new demo.
Am I the only one who doesn't like the direction the artwork is going? Maybe it's partly the presentation format but there's more to it. The early demos had a nice art style, realistic colors used in a gentle way, subtler textures. The more recent demos have shown the same super-saturated colors that plastic toy manufacturers (and Redmond OS designers) prefer to use. Even the space shots and primordial ooze scenes seem less realistic and more schematic in nature lately. In short, What was M. C. Escher is now M. C. Hammer.
Maybe they're spreading themselves too thin with an insanely aggressive multi-platform release (hello, Nintendo DS simultaneous release with 2D pixel art!?). Maybe there are some real technical challenges to making this "pervasively online yet not at risk from griefers" panacea they appear to promise. But honestly, don't make it suck on purpose.
Hmm, let me guess... (Score:2, Interesting)
Who wants to play with just the editor??? I'd have thought the first stage of spore would have been a much more interesting as a standalone, buy the first part (for DS, PC, Xbox, PS3, mac) download the full game for just XX.99 extra
The timing is just right for a "omg it's just around the corner", but the completely wrong part of the game is being sold off as a standalone.
Conspiracy theory #2 is that they don't want to pay artists to create the models of things for the final launch, better to sell the useless editor and make people do the work for them.
Am I right? Or am I right?
Re:Will this be the most hyped game of all time? (Score:2, Interesting)
On the other hand, if you expect an above-average AI with good gameplay dynamics giving an overall very pleasant experience, perhaps with a bit more of creativeness than the usual, you're in for an enjoyable experience. See Oblivion.
Even if they gave it away, it wouldn't be freeee. (Score:2, Interesting)
They should be paying us as developers!
No offense, Spore is the ONLY game I am looking forward to, but I just think this is pushing the definition of "demo"... Even if they gave it away, it wouldn't be freeee....
SimShow tool was released before The Sims (Score:4, Interesting)
I wrote The Sims character animation for Maxis, and also a tool called "SimShow [ea.com]" that we released before the The Sims release date.
SimShow enabled players to view and create their own character skins, so that when The Sims was finally released, there were already web sites publishing hundreds of characters for the game. (Many of them would have been impossible for EA to legally publish themselves, like Spiderman, Star Trek characters, etc.)
The Sims was much to complex to release a demo version, because it required a critical mass of objects to work. We could not release a stripped down version with only a few objects or levels, like most other video games. Instead, by releasing a tool to create content instead of a hamstrung demo, it improved the game when it was eventually released, instead of delaying it.
That approach worked quite well for The Sims, so it's no wonder that EA is repeating it with Spore.
-Don
Re:money off the full game? (Score:3, Interesting)
Take a look what I posted prior to this (article about anti-copyright getting removed from Canadian copyright discussion).
I'm for fair compensation for creators. I dont necessarily think it needs copyright. However, Spore-creators want to charge people to create content, which they will turn around and sell back to the creators.
I dont think what they are doing is right either.. unless they are paying people back for good content (heh heh hardly).