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IGN Review of Spore Creatures
Spore on the PC is going to be big. And I'm not just talking about the sheer scope of the project, either -- like his Sims franchise, Will Wright's ambitious life-simulation design is going to sell like bonkers when it finally ships after being in development for about a half-decade. It's not surprising that, before that tidal wave starts heading to shore, EA made sure it had a few projects ready to ride it to market. Spore Creatures for the Nintendo DS is one of those piggy-back titles, but it's honestly not a soulless cash-in -- the handheld developers captured much of the PC game's essence in a more limited fashion. It's not quite as ambitious or as open-ended as the original Spore product, but a lot of what makes that game cool has made it over to the DS spin-off.
To expect the same expansive Spore experience on the Nintendo DS is a little crazy. Horsepower and system capabilities aside, it's clear by the timing of the game that Spore Creatures was developed independently from the original game while it was still being created, so the scope of the project obviously had to be a little more "contained" for DS gamers. That said, it's pretty cool to see a lot of the same features mirrored in the handheld game, right down to the ability to create crazy lifeforms that can be sent to other systems via online support.
Spore Creatures starts out with a very rigid "adventure" design where you'll control one creature in a set storyline that involves exploring a planet and protecting one of your critter buddies. Right from the start you'll learn the ability to "evolve," or rather the ability to shift around bodyparts that will help out with defeating enemy creatures as well as accessing different parts of the world. Befriending native creatures or kicking their butts in battle will net additional body parts that will upgrade your in-game character's fighting and environmental abilities. Some parts will enable him to traverse harmful terrain or swim, abilities that become integral to the linear storyline -- if you find yourself stuck in a map, there's clearly a body part that you'll need to find or have in your inventory that will help you move onto the next portion of the adventure.
The creature creation portion is surprisingly robust even in its limited engine. The designers went with a very Paper Mario-like look for the organisms: you'll piece together 2D body parts like a paper doll to create a hybrid dimensional critter that's 2D in appearance but behaves like a 3D character. The deeper in the game you get the more parts you will unlock, either by collecting them the normal way or spending achievement points in the game's option-menu store. Because you can attach parts anywhere on a variety of different "torsos" and resize and rotate these parts once their attached, you really do have the ability to create insane and very creative beasts. The limitations do sort of hamper what the creatures look like or what they can do, and you can't tell the game to overlay one category of body part over another (mouths overlap eyes, for example), so you can't do anything you can imagine. But the amount you can do is really impressive.
But then you run into the obvious problem: just because you can create it doesn't mean that you should. You can create the coolest creature imaginable, but if you use stock body parts he wouldn't stand a chance in battle. The PC version runs into this problem as well, but it at least has the worldwide Sporepedia feature to fall back on -- you know, the ability to put your creatures on display over the Web and have people vote upon your creation virally. The DS version features a much more scaled back version of the Sporepedia where you can share your creations over the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection, but they're really just to look at and admire on the DS and only the DS. You can save any creature you see online and have them appear in your world, which is certainly cool... but once again, not so useful when the most awesome looking beasts are insanely weak in action.
The creature creator is, admittedly, a little clunky in the sense that it's really, really difficult to follow which parts have special capabilities. The designers stuck to an icon system to explain the effect of each parts' abilities, but the way it's laid out ends up being clunky and confusing. You'll eventually figure out the layout, but there really should have been a better key explaining all the little icons than what ended up in the final product.
The DS game's adventure is extremely lengthy, especially when you see the list of "badges" you can shoot for. Badges are Spore Creatures' "Achievement system," but they're more than just trophies: they're the game's currency for buying body parts and fun cheats. The adventure does have its downsides, mostly in the combat phase: it's nothing more than an action RPG-style engine that's nothing more than "scribble and move" with very little tactile feedback. The game doesn't penalize much if you do lose during a battle: you simply collapse like cardboard and end up at the last nest checkpoint where you can modify your creature to make him stronger.
©2008-09-04, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved
To expect the same expansive Spore experience on the Nintendo DS is a little crazy. Horsepower and system capabilities aside, it's clear by the timing of the game that Spore Creatures was developed independently from the original game while it was still being created, so the scope of the project obviously had to be a little more "contained" for DS gamers. That said, it's pretty cool to see a lot of the same features mirrored in the handheld game, right down to the ability to create crazy lifeforms that can be sent to other systems via online support.
Spore Creatures starts out with a very rigid "adventure" design where you'll control one creature in a set storyline that involves exploring a planet and protecting one of your critter buddies. Right from the start you'll learn the ability to "evolve," or rather the ability to shift around bodyparts that will help out with defeating enemy creatures as well as accessing different parts of the world. Befriending native creatures or kicking their butts in battle will net additional body parts that will upgrade your in-game character's fighting and environmental abilities. Some parts will enable him to traverse harmful terrain or swim, abilities that become integral to the linear storyline -- if you find yourself stuck in a map, there's clearly a body part that you'll need to find or have in your inventory that will help you move onto the next portion of the adventure.
The creature creation portion is surprisingly robust even in its limited engine. The designers went with a very Paper Mario-like look for the organisms: you'll piece together 2D body parts like a paper doll to create a hybrid dimensional critter that's 2D in appearance but behaves like a 3D character. The deeper in the game you get the more parts you will unlock, either by collecting them the normal way or spending achievement points in the game's option-menu store. Because you can attach parts anywhere on a variety of different "torsos" and resize and rotate these parts once their attached, you really do have the ability to create insane and very creative beasts. The limitations do sort of hamper what the creatures look like or what they can do, and you can't tell the game to overlay one category of body part over another (mouths overlap eyes, for example), so you can't do anything you can imagine. But the amount you can do is really impressive.
But then you run into the obvious problem: just because you can create it doesn't mean that you should. You can create the coolest creature imaginable, but if you use stock body parts he wouldn't stand a chance in battle. The PC version runs into this problem as well, but it at least has the worldwide Sporepedia feature to fall back on -- you know, the ability to put your creatures on display over the Web and have people vote upon your creation virally. The DS version features a much more scaled back version of the Sporepedia where you can share your creations over the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection, but they're really just to look at and admire on the DS and only the DS. You can save any creature you see online and have them appear in your world, which is certainly cool... but once again, not so useful when the most awesome looking beasts are insanely weak in action.
The creature creator is, admittedly, a little clunky in the sense that it's really, really difficult to follow which parts have special capabilities. The designers stuck to an icon system to explain the effect of each parts' abilities, but the way it's laid out ends up being clunky and confusing. You'll eventually figure out the layout, but there really should have been a better key explaining all the little icons than what ended up in the final product.
The DS game's adventure is extremely lengthy, especially when you see the list of "badges" you can shoot for. Badges are Spore Creatures' "Achievement system," but they're more than just trophies: they're the game's currency for buying body parts and fun cheats. The adventure does have its downsides, mostly in the combat phase: it's nothing more than an action RPG-style engine that's nothing more than "scribble and move" with very little tactile feedback. The game doesn't penalize much if you do lose during a battle: you simply collapse like cardboard and end up at the last nest checkpoint where you can modify your creature to make him stronger.
©2008-09-04, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved