Spore

**Sasaki Kojiro** · 03-07-2006, 00:36

So if I create a bunch of vicious killing machines they'll appear in other players world's and cause them much grief?

**Zenicetus** · 03-07-2006, 03:08

Originally Posted by Sasaki Kojiro

So if I create a bunch of vicious killing machines they'll appear in other players world's and cause them much grief?

Yeah, it sounds like a master server grabs the designs you've created on your hard drive, and stuffs that into a master database. Then when you need an AI opponent (you climb out of the ocean, or discover another planet), the game grabs a design (at random?) from this database and starts running it.

That is a way cool idea.... although I don't know if there is any vetting for quality of the design. People vary in their creativity, and there could be a lot of really bad designs out there. But maybe the random quality makes up for it? You'd never know if your next AI opponent would be something really cool and nasty in an "Alien" kind of way, or a giant pink fluffy bunny, or a sentient Taco with extra hot sauce... or.....

**doc_bean** · 03-07-2006, 18:29

Originally Posted by Zenicetus

Yeah, it sounds like a master server grabs the designs you've created on your hard drive, and stuffs that into a master database. Then when you need an AI opponent (you climb out of the ocean, or discover another planet), the game grabs a design (at random?) from this database and starts running it.

That is a way cool idea.... although I don't know if there is any vetting for quality of the design. People vary in their creativity, and there could be a lot of really bad designs out there. But maybe the random quality makes up for it? You'd never know if your next AI opponent would be something really cool and nasty in an "Alien" kind of way, or a giant pink fluffy bunny, or a sentient Taco with extra hot sauce... or.....

It is supposed to fill in the "gaps" in your game world: predator, herbivore, weak, strong etc. so that you get a kind of ecosystem.

Personally I'm planning on making a whole lot of non-PG characters (is that a leg or... ?) and uploading them

I've also seen November listed, but I doubt it will be November 2006, the game has only been shown at the GDC so far...

**Kraxis** · 03-07-2006, 20:19

Originally Posted by doc_bean

Personally I'm planning on making a whole lot of non-PG characters (is that a leg or... ?) and uploading them

If enough people are like you, then it should prove to be a major success I would think. Or if they were just playing seriously.

I do however fear a lot of crap-creatures to pop up, something like an eye with a single leg and a mouth on an arm. I just hope the server will have some sort of rudimentary pruningsystem to weed out the useless creations.

And I'm still planning on going centaur and mantis.

**Moros** · 03-08-2006, 14:36

Originally Posted by Kraxis

I do however fear a lot of crap-creatures to pop up, something like an eye with a single leg and a mouth on an arm.

how did you know I was...

I don't think they'll be selected on looks much because you can't expect that they are going to hire people to rate every creature. The game probably will select it based on a few stats. (So you wouldn't have to much of the same type of creatures on one planet.) But it's quite difficukt for a computer to rate the prettyness of something so that's not going to happen I'm afraid.

**Kraxis** · 03-09-2006, 01:05

No, I didn't mean looks. I actually think that if the creature works then it is cool. But undoubtedly there will be people who create creatures that just can't perform properly.

**Papewaio** · 03-09-2006, 01:55

Originally Posted by Kraxis

No, I didn't mean looks. I actually think that if the creature works then it is cool. But undoubtedly there will be people who create creatures that just can't perform properly.

Since it is procedurally based... it may be an art form to make retarded creatures that the game has a hard time making move.