Hank [BS/MSEE,
MSM $$$, Ph.D. Mgmt] teaches 
On September 7, 2008, EA [Electronic Arts] is presently scheduled to release a game that has been over three years in the making, named Spore [link to wiki spore]. Conceived of by Will Wright, the brains behind the most successful game series in history, the SIMS series, the reason you should run to the nearest store carrying it and and stand in line overnight or longer to purchase Spore is not for the game, but for its organic modeling software. Fortune in its 2/18/08 issue in an article by Michael V. Copeland p 28 states “Spore creations could become widgets on a Facebook page, animated videoclips passed around on YouTube, even physical objects etched in plastic by a 3-D printer…..” An example of the kind of creatures we are talking about from Spore’s web site is at the right/bottom
. This “game” has every indication of going beyond being disruptive following the “laws of unintended consequences;” I will be in line for my copy, I assure you. How about some of you closer to Spore jumping in???
Seems like just yesterday I ran the blog entry “Free Refills” based on a snippet from Blist, a Seattle-based company. Readers of this blog seemed to be favorably impressed. Apparently some deep pockets are also. See the following:
Breaking news from Techcrunch 2/20/08: “
Blist Secures $6.5M for Cloud Database Software
by Mark Hendrickson
Blist
, a browser-based database management application, has raised $6.5M in Series A from Frazier Technology Ventures and Morgenthaler Ventures.
The company launched in private beta at DEMO this year, although we first covered them this past November.
In addition to this funding announcement, Blist is also rolling out data importing, sharing, and charting features. The new charting capabilities can be seen in the picture to the right.
“
You read it first here: Hank 
I have been waiting for this game since the fall of 2005 when I heard about it. It is going to completely redefine video games. You get to take a single celled organism through years of evolution, although way until you are controlling an entire planet of alien creatures that can build cities and spaceships. You can literally do anything. My grades are going to plummet.
This is a very innovative and interesting idea. I really wonder how they are going to etch three dee pictures from a printer. Now that is a cool idea. ~John Fodor
You kidding me? I’ve heard my friends drone on about this game for what has felt like half a decade! (though truly not that long)
While it probably won’t demand as much time as the upcoming Wii game Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Spore is also on my wish list of games to look forward to. I heard rumor that it won’t be coming out until 2010 from a friend so I pushed Spore off my radar… but it appears that it was false. If so, then most excellent. ^^
I’ve never really been into the whole The Sims thing, but the graphics look like they are going to be amazing!
I’m in the same boat as Travis, in that I was never really into playing the Sims. That being said, I know that the Sims was an extremely popular game and I am sure that Spore will follow and will likely surpass the Sims popularity.
I was never really into the Sims thing either, but it seems that they’re people waiting for this game to come out and a lot of people seem really excited for it. So I’m sure that it will definitely surpass anything out there.
I also have been following Spore. It sounds like it is going to be revolutionary to the video game industry if it ends up being everything it is hyped up to being. Not to mention I can’t wait to play it.
I don’t see anything so special about this video game. It looks like sims with different characters and setting. I did like the Sims but I think that is because I’m a girl and I like to “play house”. This game I think is the guy’s version of the Sims. I’m not impressed (at least by the advertisements).
Regarding blist, I’m no financial analyst, but I wonder where all the millions of dollars they raised are being spent. I’d guess salaries, servers, & rent…
Kristeen, It it the same thing as the Sims, except instead of playing house you get to play universe. and the universe include lots of houses, and you get to play house with all of them!
I played the sims for awhile but i quickly grew tired of the game because it was so repetitive. I think that the graphics are amazing and the disruptiveness of the game is awesome i am just worried that if i was to purchase this, i will grow tired of the game also.
This looks to be fun way to feed the gamers that are control freaks and would love to play God.. j/k The Sims is a cool game that I found to be fun and Spore looks to be fun as well. I think they should have came up with a better name than spore. Spore sounds like a new product from Johnson & Johnson’s Clean & Clear product line. Never-the-less it will be interesting to see a triceratops running across the screen on facebook. I guess it would be safe to say that this is what happens when the Sims meet Jurassic Park?
Regarding blist as well, such a sum of money up front can often cause problems..they say that the less money most entrepreneurs have the better off they are. Once large sums of VC money is collected, the founders don’t know what to do with it, yet spend it anyway.
I have never been that big into video games, but the graphics are pretty cool and im sure many people will want to play this game.
I haven’t played very many video games on the tv or computer but last year one of my friends got me hooked on playing The Sims. If this game is anything like The Sims, it would defiantly be worth your time to try in out.
The Sims is definitely one of those games that you can get hooked on really quick. I assume Spore will be like that and catch on like crazy. It looks really cool, and the graphics seem awesome. This might be a game to look in to.
This does seem like a pretty cool idea. I’m not sure that I would go out and buy it, but I would definitely try it out if some of my friends had it. Fortune sounds like a pretty neat software and that it has the potential to attract plenty of users, myself included if I am impressed with my trial of spore.
I’ve heard people talk about this, but I never knew what exactly it was. Sounds like they’ve totally done the right thing, hyping this up for a while now. I’ll be interested to see what happens when it is released.
Sounds very interesting. So how user friendly is it? It seems like with many modeling programs that can be the downfall. Obviously if it has as much hype as you speak of, it must be incredibly easy to use, but i’d still be interested in how long it would take to learn the ropes. It looks like creates could be made complex enough that a 3D model could become quite difficult to make.
This technology sounds really interesting . Unfortunately I don’t play video games, but if I did then i would be waiting in line for this. There seems to be an overwhelming number of new widgets, but these are, by far, the newest and greatest
Im not a very big video gamer myself. Although it does sound interesting what this guy is doing. I surely wont stand out and wait for it, but I will get around to playing it some how.
So the website makes creatures? Maybe I didn’t follow.
I have never even throught about something like Spore, let alone heard about it. This seems like pretty amazing technology to be able to create something (an animal) through a video game. There are so many aspects of the game that can spin out of it, as mentioned in the article. If I was an avid gamer, I would definitely buy this; since I’m not, I will have to ask around and see if I will be able to test it out!
On another note - Blist is taking off extremely rapidly! I cannot believe that they have already secured that much money from venture companies. I’m anxious to see where they will be in a few more months.
Wow, this seems really cool. If it takes off like the sims did then many people will be getting very rich.
I personally think this will just be another game for people to sit around and be lazy and do absolutely nothing other than play this game. Good for the company and the people making money on it, but definitely not good for the well-being of people in general. Sorry to all those who are really into the “gaming” world. Don’t take offense
This game could lead the way for an unlimited number of possibilities, not just in the gaming world. Quite impressive, I should like to see Spore in action when it debuts.
Well I am no big fan of video games either (I am actually a big game addict but have stopped playing for my own good
) but like to follow whats happening around. I read about Spore a couple of days back on Wired (http://www.wired.com/gaming/gamingreviews/multimedia/2008/02/gallery_spore). It seems to be a revolutionary god game. Lets wait and watch whether it lives up to what ppl are expecting out of it.
About Blist: I too always wonder where people spend this huge amount of investment money. It’s a big mystery to me. Guess as Nwokedi mentioned earlier for paying salaries, etc. I feel that marketing a product needs a lot more money than anything else.
Well i can honestly say that i do love the sims. I always had a lot of fun with it when i was a little girl. This idea seems very cool though, it looks like it would be very interesting!!!
I think that many people here have missed the point on what SPORE can really do. Besides being a
great looking game (I’ll probably get it) it gives you some truly impressive graphics tools that
are easily carried over to other areas. If you can carry them over to facebook or youtube, you can
carry them over to other areas as well.
As everyone has stated, the graphics are phenomenal and can be put to good use OUTSIDE the game.
This is the important feature I think most people overlooked!
The sims games have always been really cool so I’m sure that this spore game will be as well.
Spore seems to be a pretty interesting idea. I know that when I was younger I always enjoyed playing games like the Sims. It was a great way to explore and express your imagination. Now with this development of Spore I think it is in fact a pretty good idea and I’m sure it will catch on very quickly.
I used to be pretty big in the gaming world (thanks to my brother). As I went through my The Sims stage, I noticed the graphics were okay and still played but they didn’t thrill me too much. The best graphics I had seen when I was still into video games had been on Final Fantasy (the most recent one). I thought that had the greatest graphics. However, after seeing the graphics for Spore it seems like it will top that. Although, I figured it wouldn’t be much of a task to top a game like Final Fantasy.
Also, Spore opens up a whole new vision for the gaming world. To be able to carry the game over onto other sites and be able to do what you what with them is pretty awesome. I’m sure that when this comes out my brother and I will be testing it out. Hopefully it doesn’t consume too much of my time.
I can’t wait for Spore to come out. I’ve been waiting for it since my freshman year when I first heard of it. I’m not sure how much I’m gonna use the youtube function though. I just wanna play, and can totally see many hours going into this game. The graphics are just a small part of this game…I’m much more interested in the building of my own culture. Bit of a god-complex I suppose, but thats what makes these games sell so well.
The reason this game is getting so much hype is not because it is the SIMS on Steroids and you get to play “house” with the universe.
This game has revolutionized the gaming industry. Before this game, video game computers spent millions of dollars hiring people to spend years developing 3d models of characters and 3d graphics for the world you see and interact with.
For the first time ever, this game gets rid of 99% of all the graphic designers and creates every model you see in the game dynamically through programming. This means you do not have a predefined “set” of models or characters you can choose from, but instead can use your imagination to dynamically create any model you wish. That, my friends, is one small step for gamers, one giant leap for gaming companies!
I’ll pretty much rely on one of my friends getting it. That way I can check it out to see what it’s like. I’ve never heard of it until now. I love playing video games, but to be honest, I’m not very interested in games that aren’t sports.