Advantages, Disadvatages and Balance

[imported_Sash]

Yo there, Spore-fans.

The creature editor in Spore is extremely flexible; you can add eyes, ears, arms, legs...anything.

How do you think the game will deal with advanatages and disadvantages between creatures? For example: If you dream creature is the carebear from the GDC presentation, and you come up against a giant spider with fifty mouths, you're clearly not going to survive.

What if your dream creature is completely weak? How are you supposed to enjoy the game if you HAVE to make your creature with 12 arms just to fight off anything which attacks you?

My theory is that if a creature has an advantage in one area, it will have a weakness in another. So if you do have a fifty mouthed giant spider, it may not be able to run fast, and probably be caught and destroyed by five carebears.

Another limit will have to be the number of creatures you can create. If you make one thousand carebears, you'll probably wipe out any species you come across. This leads into another problem (which I think is also discussed in a separate topic)...money. What is the currency going to be in Spore? There's going to have to be something which is going to stop you making one thousand carebears, whether it's running out of resources, or reaching a population cap. Which seems to me like Spore may be slipping into the RTS genre.

OK, I've spoken enough. What advantages and disadvantages do you think will have to be controlled, and how? How will the game achieve a balance between flexibility and fairness?

Sash

P.S.: That may have been my longest post ever...and look at me, I'm still going! lol! Wahoo! Yay! OK, I'll stop... :blush:

[Hawk_Eyes]

Well as for advantages and disadvantages, sometimes the best victory is an escape.

And as for currency, I don't think it's gonna work like that, think a little more like Black and White.

[OverlordBill]

Undoubtedly you'll be using the resources around your creatures as the basis for a large portion of your economy. Why don't we create thousands of adults every time we have a war? Because it's not physically possible, and resources would hit record lows, even below today's.

Currency might be one universal system, but it could very well evolve like everything else. Know how we used to use a gold standard for all of our money? Well now that little piece of paper in your hand is just that. Paper. There's nothing behind it, you can't cash it in for any sort of metal, it's just paper with green ink.

So to be more specific, the currency in the game is likely to be based on the resources you have at your disposal.

The system for importing other peoples creatures into your own game is supposed to recognized the strengths and weaknesses of your creature, and not get anything too difficult. I supposed in the early stages of the game you might just have to run away from larger creatures, but as it gets later any creature can pick up a weapon.

The whole thing is based around evolution and custom content. Who know's how versatile it may be.

[Mr.Heat]

There's going to have to be something which is going to stop you making one thousand carebears


Energy?

Or

The more creatures you have, the more it's hard to manage..



Heat

[Nightshade]

Or maybe till your comp crashes like in some other games I know! >.> :spin:

[imported_Sash]

Undoubtedly you'll be using the resources around your creatures as the basis for a large portion of your economy. Why don't we create thousands of adults every time we have a war? Because it's not physically possible, and resources would hit record lows, even below today's.

Currency might be one universal system, but it could very well evolve like everything else. Know how we used to use a gold standard for all of our money? Well now that little piece of paper in your hand is just that. Paper. There's nothing behind it, you can't cash it in for any sort of metal, it's just paper with green ink.

So to be more specific, the currency in the game is likely to be based on the resources you have at your disposal.

The system for importing other peoples creatures into your own game is supposed to recognized the strengths and weaknesses of your creature, and not get anything too difficult. I supposed in the early stages of the game you might just have to run away from larger creatures, but as it gets later any creature can pick up a weapon.

The whole thing is based around evolution and custom content. Who know's how versatile it may be.

You make very good points there. It seems resources will play an enormous part in this game, which means that Spore may be a cross between an RTS and a Simulation game.

So the limit on the number of creatures will probably be by resources.The way in which creatures are created when you have a colony is still unknown. If it's an RTS way (clicking a building and waiting for the creature to be built) then resources will probably be used. If it's a proper Simulation (as this game is meant to Simulate life as accurately as possible), then creatures will be created by parent creatures mating. This will probably use ENERGY, as Mr.Heat said. Maybe energy is the currency which is used. If your creature has no energy, it can't reproduce. Simple.

I like what you said about currency being made out of the resources available. If the game manages to do this, I can confidently say it's one of the most clever game engines out there.

Imagine a coin made out of a pumpkin...

The final point was about the online database. Sure, the computer will download what it thinks is good, but what if that civilisation decides it doesn't like how it is, and changes?

Sash

[XPDude]

I agree with Sash. There is a huge need for resource limits though. OverlordBill's example is especially true. Imagine a troop of 10000 people against a 50-mouthed spider. The game will be too easy that way.

[Sapphire]

Or maybe till your comp crashes like in some other games I know! >.> :spin:

*laughs* very true! Thanks for that Sash :spin:

[Aphid]

There's going to have to be something which is going to stop you making one thousand carebears.

I hope not :smile:

[imported_Sash]

There's going to have to be something which is going to stop you making one thousand carebears.

I hope not :smile:

lol, I'm sure there'll be cheats or trainers which will let you do this. lol. But for a fair game, there's gonna have to be a limit.

Another advantage the game will have to control are the attacks a creature can have. For example, if a flying creature (assuming that we can have them) attacks a land creature, it'll be able to fly out of the way of any of the land creature's attacks.

This reminds me of an RTS a while back called Impossible Creatures, where you would make an army of creatures by combining creatures together (i.e.: half whale, half horse). In this game, creatures who flew had advantages over land creatures. It also had disadvatages. Maybe this is how Spore will control advantages; a strength in one area and a weakness in another.

Sash

[Mr.Heat]

lol, I'm sure there'll be cheats or trainers which will let you do this. lol. But for a fair game, there's gonna have to be a limit.


And for a fair working PC too :laughing2:



Heat

[Dean]

Every one is talking about what there going to make and stuff but is anything certain yet?

[imported_Sash]

Most of the stuff we have so far is speculation, but from what was presented at the GDC, we can sort of work out what we will be able to do.

[Nightshade]

Or maybe till your comp crashes like in some other games I know! >.> :spin:

*laughs* very true! Thanks for that Sash :spin:

Wait... you quoted me but you responded to Sash, who are you talking to? :laughing2: :D

[imported_Sash]

Or maybe till your comp crashes like in some other games I know! >.> :spin:

*laughs* very true! Thanks for that Sash :spin:

Wait... you quoted me but you responded to Sash, who are you talking to? :laughing2: :D

lol, yer i was wondering about that too.

Who were u talking to, Sapphire, who?

[Moon Umbbe]

There's going to have to be something which is going to stop you making one thousand carebears


Energy?

Or

The more creatures you have, the more it's hard to manage..



Heat
I think creatures can't born just like real timed wargames. Humans must too first have a partner, and then a kid will born. And in that game, babies don't grow in second.

[Mr.Heat]

Ummm...sorry for being slow, but how is that connected to managing limitaions?




Heat

[imported_Sash]

Moon Umbbe has a point. Maybe we HAVE to make new creatures by getting two other creatures to mate. That way, this would stop us making thousands of creatures.

[MrErops]

Everything you said is pretty much true, but maybe little creatures will live longer the the bigger ones, since they would need less food. (if it will be like that) I am sure helpless creatures can create tools and have like a big group of them attack a larger creature. No need to worry I am sure Will Wright has something for the little ones.

Everything you said is pretty much true, but maybe little creatures will live longer the the bigger ones, since they would need less food.

Smaller creatures need more food compared to their weight, they have a higher metabolic rate so they have a shorter life span.

[Nightshade]

sometimes the best victory is an escape.



I still think that an extremely large creature could be king. Let them run, once they hit a dead end they're mine for the eating!

[10-Neon]

I bet there won't be a limit. Sure, you coule take 10,000 carebears and overpower a giant spider, but who's saying the game will only ever make one spider at a time? By the time you can make 10,000 carebears, the computer would have created something that can match it (like a 5,000 spider civilization.) One of the key points is that the player will never be on top.

[suomalainen]

I remember Will said you wont be always(not never) on top. Or I just remember wrong.

[strillor]

About the limit for species / 10000 carebears? :confused:

It's not totally for sure that there'll be a limit. never-ending universe and never-ending species :spin: they fit together..

[El Cid]

Well I atleast expect to be on the top of the food chain while still working my way up to the city-stage in the game. Surely, bigger is not always better, but if you already have a huge, T-Rex sort of creature, how much bigger will it get? :D

[Jeskim]

someone said that to have a army of one thousand...care bears (which makes me wonder:why are we using care bears again? couldnt we use, oh something thats not rather childish)would be hard to have unless you got a super-computer, and yet if you look at black & white 2, molyneux has said that that would be only a SLIGHTLY large amount of soldiers in his game. which shows that its POSSIBLE to have an army like that, but very unlikely as molyneux is hardly likely to give away his secrets as to how to create such a realisticly large army. anyway, bye



Jesse (or jeskim)

[Jeskim]

oops. i mean ten thousand, not one thousand :spin: confusionization....*matrix music* wuaaaaaaaaaaaaa........ :spin::spin::spin: look deep into my eyes.....

[strillor]

wonder how well a laptop will do with that amount of,, carebears? :laughing2:

but well.. In my world I won't need an army! I'm gonna be a peace-loving race :D

[Jeskim]

but well.. In my world I won't need an army! I'm gonna be a peace-loving race :D



*narrows eyes* peace loving, eh? THE GORANS SHALL DESTROY YOU AND TAKE UR PLANET FIRST!!!!AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRR!!!! :devil: <ME :smile:

[strillor]

:( :( :(

nah,, we'll have defense!

we'll be so clever so that we can use manipulation to make you jump down on a planet with NO atmosphere... ...

or maybe we'll just be all friends :spin:

[Jeskim]

*deep voice* friends? ah lets have tea! *giant creature wit ten green eyes and five tenticle arms sit down and pours a nice cup of tea and dresses like a girl, and thats not wierd because there isnt a sex in this species, they just kinda.....appear* teeeeeeeaa. yummy. would you like one sugar cube, mor two, miss killeveryone? *is talking to a doll that looks like it and has a knife in her hand...* hey wait! we not sposed to do this! KILL!!!!!! AFTER MY TEA!!! JUST A SECOND!!!!!!

[strillor]

how did you know I have a doll with a knife :shocked: psychic one... ...

naah,, BACK on subject here... this is getting way over line :spin: