Spore Preview

1UP.com has a nice preview of Spore, an ultimate universe simulation game from Will Wright. 1UP.com describes the game, "If you want to think of it another way, you'll be playing parts of Spore that have their roots in games like Pac-Man, Diablo, Populous, SimCity, and Civilization while you are responsible for much of what you create around yourself. It's taking the concept of evolution and making it fun." Spore also adds a new type of multi-player into the mix, calling it "massively single-player game". Players interact with content that has been created by others online. Will Wright explains, "What's happening is, the game is building a model of each player -- their aesthetic, their play style, their skill levels -- and based upon that, deciding what content to populate your world with. So if you're at the Creature level, it's populating your game with creatures other players have made. If you're at the City or Civilization level, it's populating your world with other cities, vehicles, buildings, and worlds that other players have made to give you good competitors." This new multi-player environment eliminates the need for players to all log on at the same time to contribute and compete in the world they create. It is an interesting and refreshing concept. I look forward to seeing the final build of Spore. (updated 05/07: check out the new Spore Footage)