Spore

by: Keaoi

Platform : PC / Mac
Genre : Cross-Genre
Context : Pacman meets Earth 2021 meets Black and White meets Civ:Revolutions(X360) meets Harvest Moon.

Gameplay : Right from the beginning you’re hooked on the simplicity of the cell stage. It almost feels like a well designed flash game, being 2d and tier-based. You can choose one of two paths from the start, either Herbivore or Carnivore, both of which give you different bonuses at the final stage of the game. Goal is simple: Eat a bunch of stuff and get bigger. This trend continues, but as this is going on, you also have mini-objectives of collecting strands of DNA in order to upgrade yourself. These range from jet-streamers that greatly increase speed, to Omnivore mouths that allow you to eat both plants and other cells.

At the end of the Cell Stage you advance to the Creature Stage, which feels like a 3d, Party based version of the Cell stage. You get a ton more editing options, as well as the option to form groups you can use to raid other Creatures in the world. I found this stage to be the most uninteresting, because it felt essentially like a 3d version of the one before it. Why that’s a bad thing, I don’t know, but maybe this has something to do with the Carnivore play style I chose. The real draw to this stage is that you really get to make your Creature your own in this stage, which is important due to the fact your creature gets locked in once you get to the…

Tribal Stage was slightly more interesting to me, because of the flexibility of your tribe members. Perhaps I’ve seen this in other RTS games, but being able to turn any class into any other is a nice change from the Industry Standard of Zerglings being useless once created until sent to inevitable doom by the Overmind. Anyway, it plays like any other RTS, except that combat is VERY straight forward. You have the Axeman, who does the most damage, the Spearman, who has range, and the Shaman who heals. Of course your can opt to avoid combat altogether, and instead arm your Tribal Horde with Instruments of Entertainment to woo your rivals to submission. I did not woo anyone.

After Tribal Domination, you enter the Civilization stage, which was also somewhat bland. Of course, with Spore you realize that the game is simple because of the massive size of it, but at the same time, you’re hooked to advance to the next stage because you feel the proverbial “Carrot” in your face. You get one land vehicle and one sea vehicle at the start, be it a war-machine or trading vessel. After you conquer/woo 4 other cities, you gain access to air vehicles, which greatly sped up the last part of this stage for me, leading to said proverbial ‘Carrot’.

Which wasn’t there. Hitting the Space Age feels great, especially as you scroll out and realize the scale of it all. You’ve become attached to your Homeworld, and to see how insignificant it is on a galactic scale is a pretty awesome feeling. Sadly, the Space Age disappointed me intensely, and I’ve still yet to finish it. The problem with this stage is that although you can build this massive Galactic Empire, your race seems unwilling to build additional ships to protect them. Having played the aggressor for approximately 4 Billion Years, my Galactic community tends to pick up on that trait, and attacks me pretty remorselessly, even though the humbling of the universal scale has pacified me.

While I enjoy a good Turtling RTS as much as the next guy, since your ‘Empire’ has exactly one ship, you are forced to constantly return to home systems to defend them. This isn’t super-annoying right at the start when you have 2-3 Colonies, but when you get somewhere around the 20+ I have, and they’re spread way the hell out, AND your opponents tend to attack where ever they want, you’ll spend most of your time reeling back on Defense. I actually purposely take over enemy outposts just to get disposable targets.

Once you’re being attacked by an Empire, they kind of focus on that spot, and it can buy you some time to take out a few of theirs. It becomes this balancing game where if you can destroy/capture in a 2:1 ratio, you are winning, and that’s that. Other Empires will fight to the bitter death, not like Civ Games where they know they’re getting trounced and beg for mercy. Not that I give it, but it’s nice to be asked, you know?

Graphics : Great, in a word. The scale of the game makes you lend some understanding to the non-next gen look, but even then, the game looks good, especially once you’re in space, looking at a planet’s atmosphere. It’s unlike a typical RTS in that detail is not sacrificed when you zoom in, no boxy Riflemen here.

Fun Factor : For all the flaws I found with the game, I can’t say I didn’t enjoy it. However, despite the near endless customization options, I have no intention on playing this game again. About as much replay value as the Black&White series, or the latest rendition of WWE.

Sound : Sound is great, and in the 5+ creature’s I’ve designed, they’ve all sounded unique. Music is somewhat odd in that you can customize what it sounds like. However, the tools used in doing so are not entirely user friendly. I’m not sure what Chess’s Knight supposedly sounds like, but a little more thought could of been put into the system. The ‘beat’ is essentially the main thing you hear, which varies from dark techno, to Rastafarian.

Summary

Good
- Cross-Genre games tend to have something for everyone.
- Creature/Building/Unit design is extremely open ended.
- Combat, though simple, is fun and entertaining.

Bad
- Though the cell/creature stages are respective 2d/3d Pacman, everything else is a bland RTS.
- Space Stage for Aggressive players is frustrating and tedious.
- Spice Trading is easily exploited, making end-game currency little more than an obligatory loophole.
Final Score: 7 / 10


I wanted to like this game more than I did. I was immediately hooked from the start, but constantly let down as I progressed through the stages. Though the game is a refreshing take on the RTS genre, the fact remains that it is an RTS, in the most bland way imaginable.

* Just a note, though it is obvious as hell… the screenshots here are from Gamespy, on the off chance you don’t recognize that logo.

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