Spore Gets Iffy Review Scores, Early Australian Release

Two German game magazines have released early reviews of EA's long-anticipated Spore, and they're a bit disappointed with what they see.

Gamestar magazine rated Spore a 79, while PC Games could only bring itself to award a 73, not awful scores by any means but certainly not what EA executives would like to see after all the time, money and publicity that's been invested in the game. According to a VG247 report, the PC Games review applauds the Creature Creator along with the virtually endless variety of downloadable content and other "community features," but calls the game out for its lack of depth until the late stages of the game, an "uneasy mix" of simulation and strategy and the fact that it's apparently easier to wage war than it is to engage in diplomacy. The review also claims Spore lacks that intangible "one more go" quality that sets truly great titles apart from the crowd.

The middling scores come on the heels of a PC Gamer U.K. cover review of the game that awarded it a score of 91, calling it "beautiful," "hilarious" and "annoyingly adorable." Online reviews in Europe are under embargo until the game's European release on September 5, although PC Gamer was given clearance by EA to publish its review early; North American reviews are also under embargo, and Joystiq says it's currently unclear when that restriction will be lifted.

Scores in the 70s aren't particularly bad (in fact, I can remember a time when it was considered pretty good) but in this day and age scores under 80 are generally considered poor, and for a game as heavily-hyped as Spore, anything less than consistent 90s is bound to lead to caterwauling about "where it all went wrong." Will Wright himself really commented about his concerns that the game has been over-hyped, but with less than a week to go before it hits the shelves worldwide, there's nothing to do about it now but stand back and let the chips start a-fallin'.

Good news and bad news for Australian gamers, too: In an unusual twist, it looks like the Aussies are actually going to be playing the game well before the rest of the world. Voodoo Extreme is carrying a report from Australian gamers that retailers are already doling out the game. No word on which stores are letting the game go early or how widespread it is, but the initial report, by "Andrew" from Australia, says, "Just picked up Spore here in Australia... retailers do not seem to be putting it on the shelf but if you ask, they pop out back and get you a copy," and follow-up comments from other users make similar claims.

The bad news? The game costs a hundred bucks Australian. Crikey, mate!

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Yep, its here. No, I won't be forking out one hundred bucks for it. I prefer to cheat on my better beaches tax thank you very much.

Importation FTW!

it's apparently easier to wage war than it is to engage in diplomacy.

It's always easier to smash someone's head in then talk him into doing it to himself..

Seriously though, not a whole lot of games get diplomacy right, in fact, most don't. Sadly that is the way i prefer to play these games.

And now, the hype machine:
There once was a man named Will who, long ago, found a powerful machine used for selling things. The machine made oogles of money and worked for years until he thought, 'What if I put it on the highest setting?' At which point, the machine exploded onto itself and our protaganist went home in shame.

It's ALWAYS easier to wage war. The mark of a good strategy game is the inclusion of enough goodies from diplomacy to make you hesitate a bit; see the Age of Empires series with a magic cash generating trade route system or any sim that allows trading for research and things one can't get out of home territory.

I have to say that vast customization doesn't necessarily translate to deep gameplay; a good example is Impossible Creatures. You could make a bearshark, or a monkeyspider, or a rhinochameleon, but it mostly was just a tossup as to whether your creature's paper was lucky enough to face enemy rock and not scissors.

You act as if only PC Gamer U.K. has given it a high score, Play has given it a 90 and PTGamers gave it a 100.

Well, it's even out on Torrents already.

Huh? Spores out already why isn't there a mass erupt of reviews on the forums?

Combat easier than Diplomacy in a strategy game? Has the world gone mad?

Yay the video game hype machine, making us expect much, much better than what there really is. No matter how good what was there before was.

Ya know, Will Wright was dead on, people expected way too much and just started going "OMFG COMBAT IS EASIER THAN DIPLOMACY?! WTF?!!?!"

Especially with all these "hands ons" and coverage of the game, people have actually played the early parts of the final product to death months before this game comes out, and then they think "this sucks" until they get to the space stages, then they think "this is awesome".

Also, with Spore, it's a game where I create civilizations of penises and make them invade other planets.

Must Buy.

That's what you get when you expect a game to cure cancer: disappointment. Just don't get to hyped up by it. I'm certainly going to buy it and I really think its going to be very entertaining.

It's a game where you make custom alien creatures, evolve them and eventually fly a UFO, what's to hype?

Seriously? Of course it's easier to wage war. Shooting is easier than negotiations. Also, they never flaunted any ultra-depth in the beginning stages (cell, creature, tribe). To me it always just looked like they were going for a kill it or dance with it kinda deal. What did they expect, civilization 4?

Im afraid I was wipped up by the hype machine. I just hope this isn't as big a disappointment as people are making it out to be. Still, you can make a race of hyper-intelligent chairs and send them to war against the evil penis monsters of the eastern spiral arm, so this is still a must buy

To me, if a game is 'guaranteed to be a 95 score' and comes out at 85, its still a damn good game, isn't it?

I'm sure if you like the idea of the game, you'll enjoy it, and a few reviews saying that it is 'very good' instead of 'excellent' won't stop too many people.

....And I'm supposed to care why?

Hey, all those who "Must Buy", let me know how the DRM works out and when they start selling copies that don't have it.

lol people who care enough to post 'I dont care' comments.

Does it get expensive, calling into daytime TV phone polls to register a 'don't know' vote?

And I fully realise I'm pretty much putting myself in the same camp by writing this, too.

I don't care if it gets bad press, I'm still going to buy it, take over some planets, then not play it for a few months until I find it in a draw one day when I'm meant to be doing work, the same thing that happens with the sims...except for the planet ruling, then it's just sim-murdering...

Yeah, it got one review that gave 100, one review that gave 91, one review with the score 90 and GameSpot gave it an 8.0. Those scores are not bad.

Metacritic is giving it an 88 right now. That's with only 11 reviews. I doubt I'll play Spore anytime soon, but I might pick it up a few weeks from now once the dust settles and people write up honest opinions about a game they've played longer than a few days.

I don't know why people are caring so much about scores, just play the game and enjoy it on its own merits. Sure you can use what's written in the review as a guide, but ultimatly it's you who will decide whether the game is worth your time.

75% of all video game journalism is corrupt, incompetent, or both. Read the review text, separate the B.S. from the facts and make up your own mind. Also keep in mind if your IQ is 150 you probably won't be challenged too much mentally by a mainstream game.

Frederf:
75% of all video game journalism is corrupt, incompetent, or both. Read the review text, separate the B.S. from the facts and make up your own mind. Also keep in mind if your IQ is 150 you probably won't be challenged too much mentally by a mainstream game.

What if that mainstream game was Final Fantasy? That game is pretty mainstream.