Spore's real costs, implications therof. A rant.

[Wolf-In-Exile]

The publisher only sees 40% of the gross, after all is said and done, and has to recover sunk costs, too.

EA is the publisher, and it owns Maxis, so all the revenue goes to EA. As far as I know, Maxis doesn't get to manage its finances independently of EA.

Spore's development began in 2000, it was announced in 2005.
If you calculate the costs from 2000, it comes to $6,250,000 a year in dev costs.
If you want to calculate the costs from 2005, its about 17,000,000 a year.

Now, for a company that nets revenue to the tune of $804 million IN 3 MONTHS, i'm pretty sure they see it as a slightly more expensive, but still acceptable amount of money spent.

This ain't no The Sims, indeed, i'm guessing it'll even out-sell The Sims eventually. EA will make sure of that.

[Gota]

I Expected Spore to be Earth V2.0 on my less than supercomputer

And the masses laughed.

BS.
Spore has a primitive gameplay.

[manored]

I played the creature, tribe and civilization phases now, and I think the creature and tribe stages are a bit shallow and unrealistic but still fun, and the civilization stage is also simplistic but deep enough in my opinion.

Even tough most gameplays from spore are strategy it seens to be aimed more at an other kind of playerbase, the kind that loves to create and share stuff, so I suppose this is why people like Gota found it shallow and boring :)

[Michilus_nimbus]

I encountered my first flying penis in the space stage today.

[Zpock]

In the space stage, do you actually build fleets of spaceships and fight galactic wars and stuff, or is it just flying around in your UFO molesting planets?

[AF]

Ive reached the space age and at first glance its simple yet theres more to it than meets the eye.

For example, I ahve red and yellow spice. Where I go and where Ive been has a huge effect on what prices I get for my spice. If I gotot he same planet over and over again the price falls, if I goto a planet with red spice and try to sell them more red spice I don't get as much, the further afield I go the more the prices differ.

It looks simple and you can play it like a simpleton, but there's more than meets the eye.

For example you can use various tactics in the tribal stage like waiting till they're all asleep then attacking their hut or befriending nearby animals. Theres masses of hidden depth.

I liked the civilization stage a lot. It was a bit wierd at the start as I was an economic city and I wanted to know where to get my guns and tanks or my religious harps people but I got there once I bought out a pious city.

[jcnossen]

IMO with all the stage/civilization stages, they drifted too far away from the real core of the game (Creating cool stuff and seeing it alive). A lot of people are buying the game because of that, and instead they have to play an rts (civ), or space rpg.

With the game technology they developed, this game could have been much more. It's about creative freedom, so why the hell can I only design 4 kinds of buildings in my city, or have only one tank type at the same time?

[AF]

Once youve built a building I think you can redesign it and build the next one.

I know when in the space stage your designs for each colony arent the same unless you go into the sporepedia and load up a prior design or download someone elses.

[PicassoCT]

IF Spore gets critical Mass (like Wikipedia) it may survive only by EA lawsuiting Movies, Comics and Books who copyied there Creatures, Buildings, Vehicles.. maybee it will even breakeven(t horizon)

[AF]

Has spore broken even through pre-orders alone yet?

[manored]

In the space stage, do you actually build fleets of spaceships and fight galactic wars and stuff, or is it just flying around in your UFO molesting planets?

You can only have allied ships (must be from allies, cant be yours) follow you, but you can have wars, and your ship becomes absurdly powerfull later on the game (you can blow up planets and stuff)

[Panda]

Smoth has made killer bug creatures to kill the cute creatures. I must make adorable, vicious creatures to surprise the spider-fanged creatures that are running around in hoards chewing on mogwais' heads.

[smoth]

good luck, I eat all cute things and perform genocide for FUN.

[manored]

I think at least 90% of everbody that ever played a god-simulation game already performed a genocide for fun :) Spore is a especially good game for this since there are many tools availble, beside weapons you can also screw up the planets climate for example, and one race told me they have a weapon that kills all forms of life on the planet :)

[Panda]

EAT THIS! IT'S HORRIFYING AND CUTE!

I think it needs a bat nose-leaf so it can look like it has sonar too.

[manored]

WOW, if thats the baby the parents must be being keept behind eletric fences :)

Its not really horrible tough, its more like a cute agressiveness... its almost as if he was saying: "Im gonna tore your head off!"

[[TS]Lollocide]

IMO with all the stage/civilization stages, they drifted too far away from the real core of the game (Creating cool stuff and seeing it alive). A lot of people are buying the game because of that, and instead they have to play an rts (civ), or space rpg.

With the game technology they developed, this game could have been much more. It's about creative freedom, so why the hell can I only design 4 kinds of buildings in my city, or have only one tank type at the same time?

See, I don't see the that as a break from the game play dynamic as its supposed to evolve past the previous styles, you aren't supposed to play the same system again and again without reaching another evolutionary level.

That said, I agree with the Game-tech bit, the game could have been more, but that's pushing the limits in my mind, I mean, could Sim's have been more? Could I have detailed how they did their job...or if they jacked off with their left or right hand. There is a point where you have to step back and say 'Ok, this is alittle shallow, but expecting a game to simulate everything is pushing it'

TBH, I would have made either the end of the creature stage/beginning of the tribal stage all about collecting sticks and rocks to make my tribal hut, that would have padded the gameplay but it wouldn't have added to the totality of the gameplay, which as it stands, is still pretty darn interesting.

[manored]

I dont think it would be very hard to make it deeper tough... for example: In the creature stage groups of AI creatures sometimes leave their nests and explore the world a bit before returning... so I think instead of making creature stage so static, groups of creatures could be moving constantly around, searching food and running from predators... that would make the gameplay funnier and more life-like. I also think that tribe stage should have been at a higher scale, with you expanding your village to confort the growing tribe and etc.

[Gota]

ITs cause the "Evolution" system in spore is so artificial and sumbed down instead ofbeng lifelike..all you need is to eat sometimes and make allies/foes which is stupid in its own way.
You dont need ot loo kfor source sof water or look hard for food and all your surroundings are very primitive as well.

[AF]

I dont think it would be very hard to make it deeper tough... for example: In the creature stage groups of AI creatures sometimes leave their nests and explore the world a bit before returning... so I think instead of making creature stage so static, groups of creatures could be moving constantly around, searching food and running from predators... that would make the gameplay funnier and more life-like. I also think that tribe stage should have been at a higher scale, with you expanding your village to confort the growing tribe and etc.

I had all that in my game. There were a bunch of ape things who were always running from the giant creatures and these giraffe like things which were hostile.

The chickens nearby kept exploring grabbing the attention of another hostile creature then running home drawing them to my nest. Its really easy to miss this sort of stuff, initially the nests are too far apart and primitive for it to happen but as you follow the path the whole thing becomes much more complex