Spore

[Nachimir]

Fucking hell it's worse than I thought, I'd only seen the McCain and Guliani figures before.

I'm a bit torn. Deregulation is extremely necessary sometimes, but wasn't recently and the fuck ups perpetrated by the Bush administration (30:1 investment banking anyone?), IMO, make anyone supporting the republicans right now an utter fool.

Knee jerk reaction is "no more money from me", but every penny I spend could be going to causes I don't agree with. Much of our taxes have gone on destabilising regions full of brown people and oil for the past seven years. The local shopkeeper you banter with might support the BNP/Nazi Front/Aryan separatists for all you know.

I used to believe in boycotting, until I realised it basically doesn't make a significant difference unless you can get everybody to do it. It turns a section of the market invisible, making it irrelevant to whatever's boycotted. I'm not arguing that we shouldn't allow ethics to inform purchasing, but maintaining an ethical position on everything you buy is simply a route to madness, because one thing after another will simply add itself to the do not buy list.

(PS Norfolk, I did actually enjoy Freakonomics, even if the post above reads like a I didn't )

[ThunderPeel2001]

It seems that the dude that wrote the "review" of Empire had only read the first five chapters and missed Card's all-important afterword:

"But any rational observer has to see that the Left and Right in America are screaming the most vile accusations at each other all the time. We are fully polarized — if you accept one idea that sounds like it belongs to either the blue or the red, you are assumed — nay, required — to espouse the entire rest of the package, even though there is no reason why supporting the war against terrorism should imply you’re in favor of banning all abortions and against restricting the availability of firearms; no reason why being in favor of keeping government-imposed limits on the free market should imply you also are in favor of giving legal status to homosexual couples and against building nuclear reactors. These issues are not remotely related, and yet if you hold any of one group’s views, you are hated by the other group as if you believed them all; and if you hold most of one group’s views, but not all, you are treated as if you were a traitor for deviating even slightly from the party line.

It goes deeper than this, however. A good working definition of fanaticism is that you are so convinced of your views and policies that you are sure anyone who opposes them must either be stupid and deceived or have some ulterior motive. We are today a nation where almost everyone in the public eye displays fanaticism with every utterance."

Edit: Actually, IS this a good definition of fanaticism? I'm not sure it is, Mr Card Does it make me "fanatical" to believe that Hitler rose to power amid lies and scaremongering? I think not

Edit edit: Oh dear

[Scrobbs]

He's just ignored the many meanings of fanaticism and twisted them all into the one that matters most, wantonly disposing of the other contextual meanings in a rather, erm, fanatical (using his working definition) manner.

[Roderick]

The flaw in the definition is easily spotted: what if you're actually up against stupid people? That doesn't make you a fanatic.

Why, I feel like I'm doing battle with idiots on almost a daily basis. That might make me a bit sanctimonious at times, at most, but nothing more

[DanJW]

It's alright for right-wing fanatics, but the liberal left wing is practically defined by seeing others point of few. Hence why republicans deride them for being wish-washy and so forth.

Interesting that no Republican supporters have chipped in. Is Thumbs entirely lefty, or are they just hiding from potential scorn?

[miffy495]

Oh man, today I got stopped by an old woman protesting the abortion clinic that's on my way to the bus stop. She was looking for my support, but I told her she was a burden on society and to go die in a fire. The bit that killed me is that when I told a guy at work this, he was shocked as all hell. Not that I'd said that, but that abortion was legal. He'd actually made it to 22 years old so secure in his little religious bubble that he didn't even realize there were conflicting opinions.

Sometimes the amount of removal the hardcore people (on either side of an issue) have from the outside world is just baffling to me.

[n0wak]

You need to get out of Calgary. Then again, your provinces got us into this mess so please fix things

Interesting that no Republican supporters have chipped in. Is Thumbs entirely lefty, or are they just hiding from potential scorn?

I don't consider myself a lefty. More centrist, with some right leaning and left leaning ideals. The thing is that I'm Canadian and a centrist Canadian is still, relatively speaking, far more left wing than the American Democrats. I think this applies to most of Europe too.

That creature creator? Pretty cool, guys!

[Roderick]

Yes, that goes for Europe as well. In Europe I'm rather centrist (Social liberalism is sort of my preferred political current of choice), but in America that'd be hardcore bolshevism

[ThunderPeel2001]

Oh man, today I got stopped by an old woman protesting the abortion clinic that's on my way to the bus stop. She was looking for my support, but I told her she was a burden on society and to go die in a fire.

Lol! That made me chuckle.

[syntheticgerbil]

...I told her she was a burden on society and to go die in a fire.

I'm shocked! You seem like such a nice person online.

Although that's a really funny story.

[miffy495]

Meh, I'd gotten about 2 hours of sleep and had no patience for her. Most days I'd just brush her off, but the tiredness combined with the lateness and seeing her huge sign calling young women who've run out of options (as well as those who use birth control) godless murderers set off this little anger cocktail. I am quite nice most of the time, honest.

And yeah, I'm a Canadian centrist too. Even voted for the tories last election because my MP had shown himself to be a pretty damn good guy. Of course, in the years hence he has seemed to become substantially more of a douchebag, so on the 14th my vote will be cast quite a different direction. But yeah, in American media terms that makes me a raving hippie with patchouli oil spurting from every orifice.

[Chris]

Uh so I don't know if this is still a political thread or whatever but my Spore name is chrisremo

[Nick]

Uh so I don't know if this is still a political thread or whatever but my Spore name is chrisremo

I buddied all the names I could pick out of the thread

Now make more stuff!

[ThunderPeel2001]

Uh so I don't know if this is still a political thread or whatever but my Spore name is chrisremo

Do you mind?! We're having a discussion here!

Oh, right...

[thorn]

My Spore name is thornate. If you want some really cool creatures, I'd recommend a mate of mine whose name is darkbulletmagnet.

[thorn]

Apologies for the doppel-pöst.

To those who have successfully reached the center of the galaxy; how the heck do I do it? Ever time I get close, my ship's travel distance gets so short that I can't jump between stars. I'm pretty sure I have the maximum rockets (certainly no-one is trying to sell me rockets any more).

EDIT: Stratch that, I just managed to trawl past the deadends to find the one route that I could take to the center. That was... pointless. Would anyone disagree if I nominate Spore for Most Over-rated Game of the Year?

As a secondary note, I think my favourite stage was Cell, but I don't get how all the other blobs are so advanced; you can only get DNA points by eating shit and if you eat too much shit you evolve to creature. Even if you continue playing in Cell and don't advance, you can't increase your DNA points any further; essentially there is a ceiling on the number of points you can get, being the same as the number of points it takes to evolve to creature. So how the heck are there creatures with ten eyes and twenty spikes and whatnot? It's impossible to get that many points. There isn't even (unless I'm blind) a cell creature editor from the start screen.

Edited October 12, 2008 by thorn

[Nappi]

Yea, I was pretty disappointed by Spore as well. The overly simple stages wouldn't have bothered me if they had still been fun but all the stages (with a possible exception of fl0w stage.. and the space one which I didn't get to try) felt somewhat dull. The creature creator is nice though.

Speaking of which. Creepy & Cute Parts Pack will be released next month for only $19,95, followed by Spore: H&M and Spore: Holiday.

[LOPcagney]

I love both the cell and creature stages, which I've played through as both an aggressive and peaceful creature, but I hate the tribal stage. In fact, I've been unable to get past it. The cell stage works as a flOw rip-off with some interesting ideas. The creature stage is amazing just for the thrill of exploring the planet. However, when you get into a game-style as obviously game-oriented as the tribal stage, Spore's weak design begins to show. I'm having a ball with the editors though, especially the vehicle ones.

[Jake]

The cell stage works as a flOw rip-off with some interesting ideas.

Wait. wasn't flOw announced after (and, if I remember correctly, inspired by) Will Wright's original GDC demo of Spore a couple years back?

[Chris]

Wait. wasn't flOw announced after (and, if I remember correctly, inspired by) Will Wright's original GDC demo of Spore a couple years back?

Jenova Chen was also one of Spore's designers.

[toblix]

Wait, wasn't he the guy in the tank in FFVII?

[Chris]

Wait, wasn't he the guy in the tank in FFVII?

He took his name from FF7, yes.

[LOPcagney]

Wait. wasn't flOw announced after (and, if I remember correctly, inspired by) Will Wright's original GDC demo of Spore a couple years back?

I was under the impression that it was inspired by spore, but that it was an example of the interpretation being inspiring to the creators of the original project. The whole jumping up levels, getting lighter towards the surface, seeing other creatures below you aspects weren't in any early trailers I saw.

But if he's on the design team, then that's different I guess.

[Jake]

I was under the impression that it was inspired by spore, but that it was an example of the interpretation being inspiring to the creators of the original project. The whole jumping up levels, getting lighter towards the surface, seeing other creatures below you aspects weren't in any early trailers I saw.

But if he's on the design team, then that's different I guess.

Either way, you referred to it as a "flOw rip-off." It's a pretty bold jump to expect people to read that as "the interpretation being inspiring to the creators of the original project." Anyway, whatever! Spore!

[LOPcagney]

Either way, you referred to it as a "flOw rip-off." It's a pretty bold jump to expect people to read that as "the interpretation being inspiring to the creators of the original project." Anyway, whatever! Spore!

Ugh. Spore did what flOw had done earlier and better, regardless of who thought of what when and while working for whom.