What Off Earth is Spore?

What off Earth is Spore? There are a lot of people asking this question, especially given the unusual Outdoor campaign they are running in certain areas. Which is indeed how I learned of the game.

EA's Spore is a massive multiplayer online game that in some ways defies categorization. In my virtual travels to research the game I have heard it called a Sim, a God Game, a Strategy Game, and a Resource Management game. And my understanding is that it is all of those things.



Interestingly, EA seems to be encouraging this sort of categorization confusion. There's very little text on their site that goes to the crux of what it is. Rather, there are multiple avenues to follow to experience aspects of the game.There is a bit of description on the site, and it goes like this:

CREATE Your Universe from Microscopic to Macrocosmic - From tide pool amoebas to thriving civilizations to intergalactic starships, everything is in your hands.
EVOLVE Your Creature through Five Phases - It's survival of the funnest as your choices reverberate through generations and ultimately decide the fate of your civilization.
EXPLORE Other Players' Galaxies - Will your creature rule the universe, or will your beloved planet be blasted to smithereens by a superior alien race?
SHARE with the World - Everything you make is shared with other players and vice versa, providing tons of cool creatures to meet and cool places to visit.





EA has been the most successful gaming company at broadening the appeal of shrinkwrapped software from the core action and sports gamer population to the broader general audience. The Sims is the big Mama of that crossover market, with its many permutations and styles of gameplay available.

Clearly, Spore is borrowing a great deal from the success of the Sims, but there appears to be a serious focus on providing more story and additional things to do.

This has been an area of criticism for some of the more recent Sims products, most notably the latest Sim City product, which added incredible realism to the process of building a community, but sorta forgot to bring the fun.

Spore doesn't appear to have that problem at all. Fist, you get to create really amazing creatures -- and there are a variety of ways to show off your creations and win prizes for your trouble. Second, they appear to be trying to bridge the gap between single player and massive multiplayer through an approach that lets you share your creatures and creations with the world.

The system clearly unleashes the creative spirit. Head on over to their site to see some of the ecosystems and characters people have created. It's absolutely remarkable.

Another key aspect of this title is the aggressive cultivation of online community -- EA recently had a fan site day to bring evangelists and potential evangelists in to meet the designers and get an early play. The level of buzz for this title is really rather impressive.



Check it out. It's definitely out of this world. I will be interested to see how broad the appeal of this title will be. Such fanciful characters have traditionally occupied a specific segment of the category -- and not a terribly broad one. Such games tend to be VERY male, whereas Sims was majority female.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to write.