I’m always fascinated to see what sorts of crazy new games Will Wright and Maxis (creators of the Sims games) come up with. Wright’s latest project, which has generated quite a buzz online, is called Spore. Players start off as cellular organisms and follow an evolutionary path (all the way up to intelligent lifeforms), tweaking (mutating) their creations as they go. This video demo by Wright at the most recent Game Developers Conference is so awe-inspiring. In a world of endless first-person shooters and racing games, Wright always bring something fresh, intelligent, funny, and creative into the mix.
BTW: Spore is built on a procedural synthesis-based approach (see previous item on the Xenon architecture), allowing tremendous amounts of game data to be stored on the game disc, traded over the Internet, etc. Wright says that he was inspired by the “Demoscene” and their ability to cram as much media data and performance as possible into the smallest amount of space.
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