Prudence and Madness

Another game in the horizon for EA Maxis, Spore, a massive online multi-genre game, is set to be launched on September 5 in Europe and on September 7 in North America and Asia-Pacific.

Some call it a god game; others simply cannot categorize it in a single game genre.  In the game, the player is allowed to design his own creature, starting from a microorganism and then nurturing it until it developed into a complex, social animal enabled to have intelligent mastery of the objects surrounding it and interacting with alien species across the hundreds of galaxies.  It is perhaps similar to the Sims 2 but is online and wider in scope.  Gameplay possibilities are enormous as one could concentrate on developing a single creature or a whole new civilization.  And while it is a single player game, one’s creatures and civilizations are automatically shared with other players, and thus the endless source of different gameplay.

Here are screenshots of the game, from the official site of Spore:

Cell Stage

Creature stage

Tribal Stage

Civilization Stage

Space Stage

If you’re interested in having this game, better check the specs so you could be better prepared when the game is finally launched:

PC SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS

* FOR WINDOWS XP
* * 2.0 GHz P4 processor or equivalent
* * 512 MB RAM
* * A 128 MB Video Card, with support for Pixel Shader 2.0
* * At least 6 GB of hard drive space

* FOR WINDOWS VISTA
* * 2.0 GHz P4 processor or equivalent
* * 768 MB RAM
* * A 128 MB Video Card, with support for Pixel Shader 2.0
* * At least 6 GB of hard drive space

* When launching the game, some Microsoft Vista users may receive a warning about running out of address space along with a link to the Microsoft Knowledge Base. If you see this message, it is recommended that you follow the instructions and go to the website listed in the message to update your system.

* For computers using built-in graphics chipsets, the game requires at least:
* * Intel Integrated Chipset, 945GM or above.
* * 2.6 GHz Pentium D CPU, or 1.8 GHz Core 2 Duo, or equivalent.
* * 768 MB RAM

* Supported Video Cards
* ATI Radeon(TM) series
* 9500, 9600, 9800
* X300, X600, X700, X800, X850
* X1300, X1600, X1800, X1900, X1950
* 2400, 2600, 2900,
* 3650, 3850

* NVIDIA GeForce series
* FX 5900, FX 5950
* 6200, 6500, 6600, 6800,
* 7200, 7300, 7600, 7800, 7900, 7950
* 8400, 8500, 8600, 8800

* Intel(R) Extreme Graphics
* GMA 950, GMA X3000, GMA X3100

* Laptop versions of these chipsets may work, but may run comparatively slowly. Standalone cards that are installed in vanilla PCI slots (not PCIe or PCIx or AGP), such as some GeForce FX variants, will perform poorly. Intel integrated chipsets featuring underclocked parts, such as the 945GU, GML, and GMS, will not perform adequately.

* Integrated chipsets such as the ATI Xpress and the NVIDIA TurboCache variants will have low settings selected, but should run satisfactorily.

* Please note that attempting to play the game using video hardware that isn?t listed above may result in reduced performance, graphical issues or cause the game to not run at all.

* The NVIDIA GeForce FX series is unsupported under Vista.

MAC SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS

* Spore requires at least the following:
* * Mac OS X 10.5.3 Leopard or higher
* * Intel Core Duo Processor
* * 1024 MB RAM
* * ATI X1600 or NVidia 7300 GT with 128 MB of Video RAM, or Intel Integrated GMA X3100
* * At least 4.7GB of hard drive space for installation, plus additional space for creations.*

* This game will not run on PowerPC (G3/G4/G5) based Mac systems (PowerMac).

* For computers using built-in graphics chipsets, the game requires at least:
* * Intel Integrated Chipset GMA X3100
* * Dual 2.0GHz CPUs, or 1.7GHz Core 2 Duo, or equivalent

* Supported Video Cards
* ATI Radeon(TM) series
* X1600, X1900, HD 2400, HD 2600

* NVIDIA GeForce series
* 7300, 7600, 8600, 8800
* Intel(R) Extreme Graphics
* GMA X3100
* This game will not run on the GMA 950 class of integrated video cards.

* *Install space subject to change.

(from Spore Specs page)

It certainly did have a lot of hype, even during the process of game development.  I think Maxis did good in releasing Spore Creature Creator to further increase the hype and thus, the excitement in having the full game on September.  With this building program, you could have a practice at creating creatures (whether you want a one-eyed monster or a creature with ten heads and 7 sets of legs with flippers) and see how they’ll look and move in a Spore environment.  You could download the free trial version or you may buy/download the full version.  I bought mine at Datablitz SM Mall of Asia and it was only around P600+.

Have a look here at my creature, Crukus, dancing:

Actually, you can record videos and snap shots of your creatures using different environments available in the building program.  I just chose to use a dark background because my computer is a bit slow.

So, have a bit of fun with Spore Creature Creator while waiting for the Spore!