this post was submitted on 15 Jun 2026
253 points (97.4% liked)

Games

49002 readers
1635 users here now

Welcome to the largest gaming community on Lemmy! Discussion for all kinds of games. Video games, tabletop games, card games etc.

Rules

1. Submissions have to be related to games

Video games, tabletop, or otherwise. Posts not related to games will be deleted.

This community is focused on games, of all kinds. Any news item or discussion should be related to gaming in some way.

2. No bigotry or harassment, be civil

No bigotry, hardline stance. Try not to get too heated when entering into a discussion or debate.

We are here to talk and discuss about one of our passions, not fight or be exposed to hate. Posts or responses that are hateful will be deleted to keep the atmosphere good. If repeatedly violated, not only will the comment be deleted but a ban will be handed out as well. We judge each case individually.

3. No excessive self-promotion

Try to keep it to 10% self-promotion / 90% other stuff in your post history.

This is to prevent people from posting for the sole purpose of promoting their own website or social media account.

4. Stay on-topic; no memes, funny videos, giveaways, reposts, or low-effort posts

This community is mostly for discussion and news. Remember to search for the thing you're submitting before posting to see if it's already been posted.

We want to keep the quality of posts high. Therefore, memes, funny videos, low-effort posts and reposts are not allowed. We prohibit giveaways because we cannot be sure that the person holding the giveaway will actually do what they promise.

5. Mark Spoilers and NSFW

Make sure to mark your stuff or it may be removed.

No one wants to be spoiled. Therefore, always mark spoilers. Similarly mark NSFW, in case anyone is browsing in a public space or at work.

6. No linking to piracy

Don't share it here, there are other places to find it. Discussion of piracy is fine.

We don't want us moderators or the admins of lemmy.world to get in trouble for linking to piracy. Therefore, any link to piracy will be removed. Discussion of it is of course allowed.

Authorized Regular Threads

Related communities

PM a mod to add your own

Video games

Generic

Help and suggestions

By platform

By type

By games

Language specific

founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
 

The evolution sim that was never meant to be.

Original Source:
Spore: An oral history by Jay Castello / Designroom (free registration required)

top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] TigerAce@lemmy.dbzer0.com 24 points 3 days ago (6 children)

The game got released in 2008, why is this a modern day article as if the game was just released, while the information is what everyone who ever played the game already knows? The game is almost old enough (just 2 more months) to get it's drivers licence and buy alcohol in my country. When I was reading this I was like: "wait... Was there a new Spore game released?" But no, it's just about an 18 year old game 🤷

I thought the world was going to shit, but apparently there's nothing else to write about than an 18 year old game, from a sea of thousands of game being released per year.

Ok, Thanks for sharing, at least it's not bullshit from Trump or Musk or whatever I guess.

[–] Einskjaldi@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago (1 children)

If you made one now it would work a lot better, modeling evolution and proteins is vastly better Science now.

[–] TigerAce@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 2 days ago

Yeah... Evolve to an inteligent species, then evolve into egocentric low IQ assholes that constantly almost blow up society because of a dick measuring contest... Until they do press the button. First dominate and kill other species, then dominate and kill your own.

Much more realistic game, don't know if it's more fun.

But jokes aside, I wouldn't mind a new version of that game, or something similar. It's rather unique in its genre.

load more comments (5 replies)
[–] sobchak@programming.dev 6 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

The game still was somewhat of a technical marvel, especially for its time. I don't think I've seen anything like the creature editor where it would allow you to create fairly arbitrary creatures, try to automatically detect what was the head, torso, legs; and try to animate them all correctly. Then, entire creature definitions were encoded into small PNG files using stenography, which could be shared with minimal data usage.

[–] tomkatt@lemmy.world 15 points 2 days ago

Those of us not in the industry refer to that as "lying."

[–] MrScottyTay@sh.itjust.works 8 points 2 days ago

As a kid my first experience of it was a friend playing it so I got that feeling of wonder from that instead of trailers and the like, and because of that i was very satisfied with the game

[–] wuffah@lemmy.world 100 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (4 children)

Bullshit.

EA did what they’ve been doing for 30 years: buy a competing game studio, release a few token cash grab titles under their beloved name, then shut down the studio and lay off all the developers. EA mediocritized Will Wright’s original vision for Spore, and trashed the last SimCity game with their always-online, closed architecture and slapdash support.

The really insidious part is that EA does make fun games, but they have remade the industry in their image: closed source, online only, DRM-infested, yearly release, day-one “expansion”, cash grab software that inspires none of the community and creativity that used to foster legendary franchises. And, they’ve killed countless game studios to create a quasi-monopoly to do it with.

I am still bitter over what they did to Maxis. I will never buy another EA game for as long as I live.

The mediocrity as I understand was from the rift that developed in the team about the vision of the game being a sandbox vs a campaign.

However, I witnessed a new divide among the team which was less well-known; as more core game developers (such as myself) were recruited to help finish the game, a cultural gap emerged between the newer ‘gameplay’ team and the older ‘Sim’ team. The former group (which went on to spearhead Darkspore) was primarily concerned with how Spore played as a game. Were the mechanics engaging? Did the player’s choices matter? Was the game replayable? In contrast, the ‘Sim’ team carried the traditional Maxis DNA and was more comfortable with Spore as a toy box. Could the players express themselves? Was sharing one’s creations with other players meaningful? Did the game spark the imagination?

These cultural divides ruined Spore’s chances to be a focused, cohesive experience.

http://www.designer-notes.com/2013/09/

[–] ampersandrew@lemmy.world 26 points 3 days ago (1 children)

"Closed source" is reaching. As much as I think Doom shows why it should be desirable, let alone not taboo, it's always been the industry standard and applies to 99.99% of games.

[–] wuffah@lemmy.world 17 points 3 days ago

Certainly. I probably should have said “extensible” or “mod-able”.

[–] sydd@lemmy.world 5 points 2 days ago

SimCity is the last time I was excited for a modern remake of a game, and likely the last. It was such an incredible letdown, you couldn't even open the game at launch because of the always online stuff. Most every remake of a classic has been terrible ever since, I'm happy to be proven wrong though.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] sirico@feddit.uk 21 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Yeah we were there when it happened

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] Zozano@aussie.zone 41 points 3 days ago (1 children)
[–] samus12345@sh.itjust.works 7 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

RIP VG Cats!

[–] Redditisbollocks@feddit.uk 50 points 3 days ago (3 children)

We know this.

We've known this for decades.

Why is this now news?

Slow news day?

[–] placebo@lemmy.zip 16 points 3 days ago (6 children)

It's just a summary of a recent interview, relax.

load more comments (6 replies)
load more comments (2 replies)
[–] HexagonSun@lemmy.zip 30 points 3 days ago (2 children)

The thing that really bugged me about Spore was how lame the “evolution” was.

If early developments in your creatures set certain things in motion that then played out differently that would be great and add replay value.

But nothing was meaningful at all, you could completely change stuff back and forth. Very little in your evolutionary history actually mattered, at all.

[–] Rooster326@programming.dev 6 points 3 days ago

That's because ~~children~~ adults would get stuck on a path that was untenable, and management didn't like that idea. It would lead to a bad experience and a negative review.

[–] WolfLink@sh.itjust.works 4 points 3 days ago

There were a couple details that mattered.

Whether you were aggressive vs friendly vs neutral at each stage had some consequences for all later stages. Creatures you befriend in the Creature stage could become pets in the Tribal stage, which could include the powerful lone wolf ones.

[–] Underwaterbob@sh.itjust.works 6 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Exact same thing that happened with No Man's Sky. That first trailer was so obviously curated out-the-wazoo, and I remember people insisting it was the last game they'd ever need to play based on it alone. And we all know what happened when that one came out.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] RebekahWSD@lemmy.world 10 points 3 days ago (5 children)

I loved Spore, but I'm easily pleased with video game. I liked creature stage the most, but also liked space and puttering around!

load more comments (5 replies)
[–] LovableSidekick@lemmy.world 5 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Translation: "We were just shitting you, so don't buy our game."

[–] ddplf@szmer.info 4 points 2 days ago

Now I'm really worried that this chould severily damage the sales of this game

[–] GrayBackgroundMusic@lemmy.zip 7 points 3 days ago

Oh I remember this game. I'm still irritated at the fraudulent claims. The game was not at all what I expected. Marketing can eat me for this one.

[–] hoshikarakitaridia@lemmy.world 21 points 3 days ago (5 children)

But spore was awesome though

[–] iamthetot@piefed.ca 37 points 3 days ago (2 children)

I think some of the love for Spore is rose-tinted glasses. It's ultimately kind of a shallow game. The sim aspects are not very well fleshed out, and 90% of the content of the game is really in the space age.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] original_charles@lemmy.world 13 points 3 days ago

So long as you turned on Stellaris when you got to the space stage

[–] echodot@feddit.uk 8 points 3 days ago

It had the depth of a cup of spilt coffee, once you've played through it once there's no additional content to experience.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] kilgore_trout@feddit.it 7 points 3 days ago

It might be worth to link to the original source: https://www.designroom.site/spore-an-oral-history/

Design Room is a new online magazine authored by one of the writers laid-off by Vox Media when it acquired Polygon.
You can read the Oral Histories after a free subscription.

[–] ZoteTheMighty@lemmy.zip 16 points 3 days ago

Every creature on the box art is impossible in-game one way or another.

[–] justOnePersistentKbinPlease@fedia.io 15 points 3 days ago (4 children)

I played the simple shape demo of the creature world.

It was vastly superior to the crap they launched. It had an actual ecosystem, but admittedly led to you dying a lot at low tiers because you were the equivalent of a meal worm.

load more comments (4 replies)

Electronic Arts deserves every bad thing that happens to them. Vulture capitalists.

Fuck EA.

[–] MisterCurtis@lemmy.world 13 points 3 days ago

I mean, they did have some interesting ideas early on that I was surprised didn't make the cut. https://www.spore.com/comm/prototypes

[–] daniskarma@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Spore taught me a lesson on not trusting hype.

It was my first experience with a hyped disappointing game.

Also I do not think it was something technical. It was just EA evilness to their marketing team though that a more child oriented game would sell better than the hardcore simulation the devs wanted to make.

I still remember that E3 trailer with the willowsaur, it showed more advanced characteristics that the final product. They straight up downgraded their game.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] Kolanaki@pawb.social 7 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

The only fantastical promise about the game I ever remember reading was the animations were supposed to be kinesthetic based on how you made your creatures; kinda like how GTA's Euphoria physics engine works.

And as far as I had read regarding that, they were struggling with it and had to abandon it at the behest of management not giving them more time to figure it out.

[–] Kushan@lemmy.world 7 points 3 days ago (4 children)

I know this is a dirty thing to say, but this feels like one of the few actual genuine use cases for AI in games.

Animations are extremely finicky and requires a lot of manual tweaking and adjusting to get right, it doesn't surprise me that they struggled to make a procedural animation system because if they could solve that, they'd actually solve a well known industry challenge.

If you were building spore today, you could train a little local model that purely creates reasonably good animations for arbitrary creature designs. It wouldn't be perfect, but for a game like Spore it would be good enough.

load more comments (4 replies)
[–] Murse@slrpnk.net 6 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Spore devs say the evolution game's previews were more ambitious than what they were actually making

Not often they just casually admit to false advertising like that.

[–] AwesomeLowlander@sh.itjust.works 9 points 3 days ago (2 children)

The devs didn't handle marketing.

load more comments (2 replies)
load more comments
view more: next ›