Spore presentation from GDC now available!

[Marek]

Here: http://www.pqhp.com/cmp/gdctv/

Sadly I have no sound here at work, so I'll have to wait another two hours to see it.

[vimes]

Here: http://www.pqhp.com/cmp/gdctv/

Sadly I have no sound here at work, so I'll have to wait another two hours to see it.

Seen it yesterday, but didn't have the courage to start a thread about it.

Anyway, the presentation is interesting and pretty impressive like any project going against the mainstream but it's quite obvious that a programmer is talking : one, as a programmer or a technician, can be impressed by how the game is made but the final result contains as many pros (the gamer become the creator and the game is only limited by the gamer's imagination) as cons (it lacks of artistic direction on story and graphics and the game will indeed be limited by the player's imagination).

The zoom-in/zoom-out effects remain really astonishing.

[vimes]

I highly recommend watching the Katamari Damacy presentation as well. I was there for that one (and the Spore presentation ), and Takahashi reveals himself as precisely the person to imagine KD, in all its weird but charming glory.

I found that extremely boring but it's partly due to the lack of enthusiasm of the traductor, so after 20 minutes of non-existent content i decided to give up .. maybe subtitle presentation for the website would have been far better.

[Roderick]

Wright is a funny, sympathetic guy! Spore looks nice. I don't know if it'll be a game so much as a sandbox. Still very interesting and impressive.

[vimes]

Wright is a funny, sympathetic guy! Spore looks nice. I don't know if it'll be a game so much as a sandbox.

I don't know, I mean it won't be more of a sandbow than any other sim city-like, will it ?

[Roderick]

I'm just curious how deep the game will be. From this one presentation it seems like a huge array of funny tools to tinker with, but is there a game in there?

[Marek]

Before I comment on this: is anyone seeing any slides, or are they missing from the presentation?

[Chris]

I'm just curious how deep the game will be. From this one presentation it seems like a huge array of funny tools to tinker with, but is there a game in there?

Well, again, probably it'll be similar in game-ness to other Sim-esque games...

[MrHoatzin]

I'm just curious how deep the game will be. From this one presentation it seems like a huge array of funny tools to tinker with, but is there a game in there?

There is more of a game in there than there is game in Half-Life or Full Throttle.

And no, I am not seeing any slides either.

[Chris]

There is more of a game in there than there is game in Half-Life or Full Throttle.

Yeah, this is what I decided I should have said like two seconds after I made my post (with any number of examples) but I didn't feel like editing.

[Chris]

No, they don't show any slides. Once Spore itself starts being presented, it is shown.

[Marek]

I'm just curious how deep the game will be.

Will Wright answered this in the presentation. He wanted to have the best 20% of SimCity, the best 20% of Civilization, etc. That should give you an idea.

From this one presentation it seems like a huge array of funny tools to tinker with, but is there a game in there?

Uhh. It's a game. And that's amazingly shortsighted to say (sorry), considering the presentation was meant to focus on the procedural and user-created content. Although he showed a lot of the game, clearly this is not the complete pitch.

[BigJKO]

No slides. And I'm super-impressed. When does this come out, again?

[tabacco]

Yeah, you have to remember that the point of GDC is not to show off the game to marketing types and the press, it's to share design and programming ideas with other developers, which is why he's not showing off the billion and one aweome points about his game.

[lailoken]

Will Wright has to be the proverbial mad scientist. The amount of knowledge and enthusiasm he shows during this presentation is mindboggling to a degree it's almost (but not really) scary. The way he looked at the evolution of algorithms versus data was inspiring and novel. The game he showed was very interesting to me and in this presentation first and foremost a credit to his procedural approach, showing that it is actually not only feasible but also quite simply (without exaggeration) genius. I for one thought this and the presentation by Takashi on Katamari Damascy where actually able to make some really good points not only in the show and tell sense (or should I say "hey this is my new game sense"?).

Talking about Spore as a game is an intirely different matter. What was shown at this meeting -to me- makes it quite difficult to judge how fun it is to play this game. The whole idea is utterly briliant and the real question for me is if it manages to stay interesting. The whole creation/evolution process seems to be fun but it remains to be seen if once you have built your first creature it will manage to stay interesting. What we saw however is not a good guide to understand how it works, as there is undoubtedly going to be a lot of challenges on the way that Wright - in order to get to the stuff that was most interesting to him - just skipped. The other big question to me is how tight and immersive the world is going to be. Will the gravity of different planets together with the atmosphere make for entirely different possibilities. Is the development of vegetation and the simulation of an ecosystem part of the program or will that be just an afterthought? How does technology work? Will you have to do research? All this and lots more still remains to be seen. However at this point I have to say just playing around with it the way Wright did could probably occupy me happily for a couple of weeks...

[SoccerDude28]

I have the utmost respect for Will Wright. The quy is a genius. I know lots of people here don't like the Sims or its sequel, but there is no denying its charm and innovation.

When I saw Spore in this demo, it blew me away. **** graphics and not looking good, this game oozes technical innovation. Procedural movement and interaction? Everything in your game comes from other users? Even the dances are procedural based on the shape of your creature? That is what next-gen is about, not a bunch of shiny graphics and an enemy that doesn't even duck for cover, or a cut scene after cut scene of animation like gameplay. Next gen is about GAME innovation, and Will Wright is the only one doing that so far. He could have stayed in the laurels of his Sims franchise and made a gazillion more bucks from Sim 10 Shopping Spree, but this guy loves games and loves making games.

The only thing more astonishing than Spore, is how it will come out from a publisher like EA.

[lailoken]

yeah I'm sorry but this is just one game

this is not the first of a revolution.

I have no doubt about the success of spores because

the hardcore sceene by now is strong enough to support its babies

but it's not going to sell like Halo 2 or GTA:SA so nothing is going

to change. change will take time...

About the graphics:

I certainly hope that they do some more work on the skin-texture-procedures as of now they still look pretty shitty and I would certainly enjoy it way more to create better looking creatures.

[tabacco]

About the graphics:

I certainly hope that they do some more work on the skin-texture-procedures as of now they still look pretty shitty and I would certainly enjoy it way more to create better looking creatures.

Again, GDC is not E3. Barely-functional betas are perfectly acceptable, since it's not intended to showcase the product to the d the public. Don't expect GDC demos to look presentation quality.

[Roderick]

What I meant to express was more the worry that it'd be more of a collection of Pirates-esque minigames. I'm still thinking in terms of narrative development, which Wright clearly said isn't present in his game in such a clearly defined form. So maybe I should keep my mouth shut.

[vimes]

but it's not going to sell like Halo 2 or GTA:SA so nothing is going

to change. change will take time...

You know, The Sims has been in the top of the chart for three years. I think a game with a box featuring " by the creator of THE SIMS!" would sell a LOT.

I'm still thinking in terms of narrative development, which Wright clearly said isn't present in his game in such a clearly defined form. So maybe I should keep my mouth shut.

I wonder if that procedural method can be extended to the story : artists would create small parts of stories and the game would assemble them to create a storyline appropriate to the situation of the world and how the gamer behaves. I think a similar thing was featured in an AMIGA game called Chicago.

[baconian]

I wonder if that procedural method can be extended to the story : artists would create small parts of stories and the game would assemble them to create a storyline appropriate to the situation of the world and how the gamer behaves. I think a similar thing was featured in an AMIGA game called Chicago.

It can, but nobody in the game industry seems to be interested in doing it. Lots of stuff about it

here and here

[Chris]

What I meant to express was more the worry that it'd be more of a collection of Pirates-esque minigames. I'm still thinking in terms of narrative development, which Wright clearly said isn't present in his game in such a clearly defined form. So maybe I should keep my mouth shut.

Especially since narrative development has a billion times less in common with the concept of a game than do, say, minigames.

[Roderick]

No, but they do create a more complete experience in my mind. Which is a personal opinion that I recognize for its subjectivity and relativity.

[SoccerDude28]

No, but they do create a more complete experience in my mind. Which is a personal opinion that I recognize for its subjectivity and relativity.

It's just as much of a game as The Sims was. The Sims had no real narrative. Actually in his talk, will write mentions that he believes in letting players craft their own story, and not impose it on them. So in his mind, while you grow your creature, change its look, make it interact with different civs, and go talk to different planets and galaxies, you are crafting your own narrative.

[BigJKO]

will write... Will write.... will write

Y'know, it shouldn't bother me that you type his name incorrectly. But somehow it does. Maybe it's because it feels more like you're ending a letter, than typing a game designer's name. I don't know.