re: Exclusive: But Wait, There's Spore! Executive Producer Lucy Bradshaw Spills the Beans On How the Game Has Evolved For Nintendo DS, Mac and Mobile Phones

Evilbaby — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 16:49:39 GMT

How much would it freak you out to see your own creature in somebody else's game!? Like you share with your friend....a few weeks later you see it on a youtube video from some guy in Japan. Seriously this game is blowing my mind and I have no idea what its about or how to play it.

re: Exclusive: But Wait, There's Spore! Executive Producer Lucy Bradshaw Spills the Beans On How the Game Has Evolved For Nintendo DS, Mac and Mobile Phones

jaytee33 — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 03:49:58 GMT

I would very much like to know the answers to a couple of questions. I haven't seen these answered anywhere else.

First, will there be true evolution in Spore? That is, will I be able to let ecosystems run on their own and have the genomes of the populations evolve through natural selection, the way that it happened in SimLife? That was the entire raison-detre of SimLife, and it's the reason it still fascinates me to this day, to the extent where I often feel moved to fire it up on today's vastly more powerful hardware. I know that Will is also very interested in evolution, and it seems as if the parameter space within Spore would lend itself very easily to computer-driven evolution, to such an extent that I would be rather surprised if it weren't in there.

Second, is the plant life user-generated? I've seen a number of bizarre and alien plants. How does the plant life work and what's the relationship between the creatures and plants?

Computer evolution is one of the most powerful arguments against the fallacy of intelligent design. If Spore evolution is entirely user-driven, it might unintentionally act as an argument in favor of ID, or at least it would be a failed opportunity to demonstrate evolution. I hope someone from EA can answer these questions, I'm very interested and I know several biology professors who are as well.

Finally, Mr. Croal, I don't know how long you've been around at Newsweek but I've just started noticing your columns. They've made a bit of a splash. They're very well written and well reasoned and it's very nice to see some good games journalism. Most games journalism is just payola garbage or mass-market tripe, especially in mainstream media, and I hope to see you continue the good work.