Spore - the epic disappointment

[Needcatscan]

I encourage anyone thinking of buying this to check out the Spore forums and especially the Amazon.com reviews. I preordered this sucker (paid in full) and then d/led it three days before it came out because I didn't want to wait for it. Thank the FSM I did too; not only was the game an extreme let-down (to put in nicely), but the DRM protection is apparently ridiculous. Also, EA has threatened to ban spore accounts (meaning they would have to buy another one to continue playing) of anyone who complains about the DRM on their forums and they have publicly said they are trying out new schemes to make second-hand selling impossible. Needless to say I deleted Spore off my computer and got a refund on my pre-order. I personally won't buy another product released by EA; when you treat your fan base like crooks, it will come back and bite you in the ass.

[ExoByte]

Also, EA has threatened to ban spore accounts (meaning they would have to buy another one to continue playing) of anyone who complains about the DRM on their forums While I have nothing to really say about the rest, except that I thoroughly enjoy the game, I strongly suggest you get your facts straight. If you had any idea of what actually happened on that forum you would realize the collosal amount of bull this one statement holds. A frustrated forum moderator merely spoke out of turn saying that people who complain about it are at risk of being banned from the forums and thus the game. Not an hour later a producer came on saying that the claim is outright false and that no one will be banned for complaining about the DRM. From what I understand, the moderator in question got quite the lecture on his jurisdiction as well.

[aceofspades]

I really enjoy the game. Why can't you just get a crack to take away the DRM. it is completely legal because you own the game and therefore are allowed to do what you want with it. So just go to google and get a crack and problem solved. I use crack for even the games I buy...I hate having CDs laying around and having to pop a CD in everytime I want to play a game.

[ExoByte]

You don't need the disk in the drive to play Spore regardless. Once it's installed you can play it without the disk.

[aceofspades]

DRM is so damn stupid. it only hurts normal people. People who actually pirate games well just download a crack....There is no way to keep a game from being cracked. Anyone can just find the copy protection in the hex and delete it...

[Sisyphus50]

I waited for Spore for 4 years, and I am very disappointed. A "few" things about it that irritate me: - The Aquatic stage between Cell stage and Creature stage was thrown out during production. It might appear at a later date in an expansion, who knows. Don't be trotting out footage of Aquatic stage at E3 then scrap it from the game. - The Creature Stage is very limited. You eat fruit and make friends. Or you kill your neighbours and you eat them instead. If you didn't start with one of EACH mouth from the cell stage, it is impossible for you to get all the mouth upgrades (as you will only be able to pick up the mouths of the type you started with). - The progression of Creature stage feels very backwards. You spend the entire level putting on the 'best' mouths, hands, legs, whatever onto your creature so it can defend, attack and social its way to the top of the food chain as easily/quickly as possible, then for your final evolution to rip most of it away to make the character how you ACTUALLY want it to look for the rest of the game. Otherwise you gimp your character for the entire level by using body parts with lesser stats just so it looks the way you want it to end up. A smarter way of tackling this would have been to make DNA points the currency to buy upgrades and skills from some kind of 'evolution tree', and just let the body parts be body parts for aesthetic value (while still giving the generic ability of spit, strike etc to certain body parts that require them). - Completing the achievement of "Kill an Epic Creature in Creature Stage" is nigh impossible on any difficulty higher than Easy, and at that it's not a walk in the park either. Epic creatures 1-shot your 250hp rogues, making them just as useless to fight with as any other creature you befriend. - Tribal stage just feels so clunky. You can't click on the map to make your tribe move like you can in every other RTS made in the last 15 years. They will only respond to commands given in the main window instead. - A winged, flight-capable tribe member when surrounded by enemies WILL NOT flying away when told to move somewhere. This is just poorly thought out and terrible lack of foresight. - The 90% of the tribe outfits are completely pointless. If you want full bonuses in gathering, combat and social, there are always three 'best' items for you to wear. Why would you wear a shitty item with less stats? - Why are my global civilisation ('modern') civilians wearing tribal outfits? - The inability to click on a city on the map and have its interface pop up makes creating a specific unit type (religious as opposed to say, military) from a particular city rather annoying, especially when your units lose HP just for converting a city even when they AREN'T being shot. The act of converting a city rapes your army even when you aren't being fired at. - Air units are buggy as hell. One version of religious flying saucer I made would just fly circles around my enemy planes and never fire a single shot. - I'm yet to beat the civ stage on Hard without cheating, as it borders on 'stupid hard' rather than 'difficult hard'. - My biggest problems with the game are with Space Stage, as it's where you spend most of your time. Number ONE biggest problem with it: having more star systems under your control doesn't do SHIT for you other than increase the likelihood that you'll have to defend against a pirate raid or eco-disaster. - The fact that my empire spans several (hundred) star systems, and I have to ferry the spice around MYSELF is pretty piss-poor design. There should be trade ships moving actively between all of your star systems, delivering the different flavoured spices to different worlds, and you should get a commision on it. - I can't add fighters from my own world to be my allies, thus preventing my allies ships from dying when I go into battle because they are all paper-thin and prone to dying, thus lowering my friendship rating with my allies. - Holy crap please give me a macro button for the layout of a colony. I am sick to death of dropping three colonies on a planet, then having to go to the Sporepedia on EVERY new planet to select my own three House, Entertainment and Factory designs, then to have to click and drag them onto their building slots - identically - 3 times for every planet I colonise. It's pointless, it's monotonous, and it serves no practical purpose other than to WASTE YOUR TIME and test your patience. - Finding planet-sculpting artifacts is cool. Finding the same ones (doubles) over and over and over and over when you still have slots for missing ones is stupid. By all means, let me keep finding the scrolls and precious stones because I can at least sell them. - The fact that your home planet RIPS YOU OFF for everything you buy. Your home empire is the very LAST place you ever want to go to buy things - is this not completely ass backwards? It should have been made that your home system only has SOME of the items for purchase (based on your evolutionary history), but those specific items are dirt cheap. - The inability to buy things like colony packs more than one at a time. Holy crap is this annoying. Having to fly from one planet to another over and over to purchase my Colony packs from some foreign race one at a time @ $75,000 is just assinine and time consuming. That's really all that comes to mind right now, but really, need I say more? edit: DRM is so damn stupid. it only hurts normal people. People who actually pirate games well just download a crack....There is no way to keep a game from being cracked. Anyone can just find the copy protection in the hex and delete it... I know of a place where Spore was available for download - cracked without DRM - 3 days before its Australian release date. You obviously couldn't go online with it, but to be honest from what I've seen, you're not missing much. And you can just download a 'creature pack' from a torrent website that has a few thousand unique creatures in it anyway.

[hungrymanz]

I ain't getting Spore, I don't buy into game hype. I was considering pirating the game just because of DRM but then again, I don't really care.

[Maeni]

I was hyped up since 2005. Spore came out. I bought. I played, had fun. It wasn't as awesome as it was hyped to be, and I never expected that. It was an awesome game, and it is worth playing. DRM and SecuRom is a completely different issue, and that should have nothing to do with how good the game was or wasn't. With SecuRom, I sort of feel this way, that people heard about it, heard about how it installs itself much like a virus does, and operates in the System32 folders, so people rage over it because the smart people who 'knows what the DRM can do.' does. However, SecuRom is and was a very stupid concept. Pirates were not hit at all. Consumers think they were kicked in the face. But in reality, the only people who were kicked in the face were EA themselves. "You can only install 3 times D:" Yeah, I have no idea how the hell that is supposed to stop pirating... Anyways, I've had no problems so far, I've only installed Spore once, and I don't see why I should feel like re-installing it twice (especially since I know it wont work :v) But I don't see why this is a reason to go all roar over Spore, it's not that bad. TL;DR: Spore: Awesome, but not as awesome as it was hyped to be. DRM : EA got pwned by themselves, but managed to hurt the consumers while pwning themselves. I just love how Spore became the most pirated game in a week xD But I feel sorry for Will Wright

[aceofspades]

drm is a horrrible idea for PCs. It does work (although it can be broken...eg the wii) for consoles but for the Pc it is so incredibly easy to break. It usually just a patched .exe. Same thing for music just run it through a program and the DRM is gone...all it does is screw the normal consumer that plays by the rules

[Xei]

I personally won't buy another product released by EA This statement has been made repeatedly for about 10 years. EA are pretty much the scum of videogame companies, if you didn't already know. This whole DRM cock up is really no surprise.

[aceofspades]

yup and they just don't understand that they aren't achieveing ANYTHING!

[Needcatscan]

While I have nothing to really say about the rest, except that I thoroughly enjoy the game, I strongly suggest you get your facts straight. If you had any idea of what actually happened on that forum you would realize the collosal amount of bull this one statement holds. I stand corrected; you didn't have to be an ass about it though. And Alextanium pretty much summed up why Spore wasn't what Maxis said it would be and why it was such a big disappointment. For the people who like it, that's great, I'm glad some people enjoy it and didn't listen to the hype.

[Sornaensis]

This game looked poor in the previews... I mean, I could see it as being insanely one-sided and monotonous. Especially when I heard that your "creature" went through stages and evolved through plastic surgery. Nothing made sense in that game in the previews. This is why RTS + fledgling concept + The sims = Failure. Gush. But, at the same time much laughter was derived from its crash and burn.

[Needcatscan]

This game looked poor in the previews... I mean, I could see it as being insanely one-sided and monotonous. Especially when I heard that your "creature" went through stages and evolved through plastic surgery. Nothing made sense in that game in the previews. This is why RTS + fledgling concept + The sims = Failure. Gush. But, at the same time much laughter was derived from its crash and burn. Well, adding the sales between the 3 different platforms it has sold over a million copies; but considering the development time I'm sure its cost was way higher than any other game made. Also, it is officially the number 1 most pirated game. This is most likely due to people wanting to make a point to EA.

[L33tsaber]

I was rather excited for the game... until I read the reviews on Amazon. And then watched the Zero Punctuation critique. ...So I ended up not getting it. I can wait a few years for it to drop in price if I ever want to play.

[Bayside]

I enjoyed the game, I got it and played for like 16 hours, got to the space part and got bored. It was fun, but the best stages ended too early and felt too rigid and linear. It could've been better for sure, but I'm satisfied with it anyway, I typically don't play games for more than like twenty hours unless they have awesome online like Starcraft....