After just two weeks and change on the market, EA and Maxis’ Spore has sold through over a million copies. The company announced today that Will Wright and team’s sim-everything game is, officially, “a hit.” That million-plus figure counts sales of the Windows, Mac and Nintendo DS versions of Spore, but not the mobile and iPhone versions.
While EA was trotting out numbers, it wanted to mention that some 25 million things have been uploaded to the Sporepedia, a figure we’ll presume includes all the goodies uploaded via the Spore Creature Creator. So, now you know!
Despite receiving generally favourable reviews from game critics everywhere, the Amazon shopping populace didn’t take so kindly to EA’s PC release of Spore. Slapped with a one-star rating out of five, the majority of complaints weren’t directed at the game’s quality — though some did take issue with the core gameplay mechanics, venting how underwhelming the game felt after years of hype. No, it was Electronic Arts’ implementation of digital rights management via Sony’s SecuROM copy protection scheme that angered the masses.
In the beginning Wil Wright created the idea, but not the name. Now the game was formless and empty, darkness was over the deep concepts, and Wright was hovering over his small group of developers. And Wright said, “Let there be five stages in the game,” and there were. And Wright said “Let the waters teem with living creatures, let birds fly above the planets, and let gamers produce them all.” Wright saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was real-time strategy, and there was procedural animation and perhaps even firmament, though I’m not quite sure what that word means. It was the sixth year.
Here’s a thought. Why do we insist on associating games, or entire game series, with a single developer? Everyone does it, but just like in the movies, it’s all a bit silly. At best it’s generalising, at worst the right people aren’t getting the right credit. Look at Star Wars – it’s synonomous with George Lucas. Empire is acknowledged by all the cool kids as being the best of the six. But Lucas didn’t direct Empire. Irvin Kirschner did.
