When the editors do come they come all at once in a rush ( I have to design four types of buildings and three types of vehicles before I can play? Too much!). I enjoyed building the first one but by the third building I was just hurrying to get through it ( Box, door, obligatory spikes and we’re done). So far its just not been compulsive or that engaging, I’m finding it hard to care about my creature or civilization despite the editors. Somehow Spore gives me less of a sense of ownership over my species than a game whch has been doing almost the same trick for years; Civilization.

9/10 for the ideas behind the game (procedural, epic scope)
6/10 for the execution (in the first four stages)

Anyone else think the first stage was the best of the first four?

Creature stage: Wow, how does that even eat? I’d better get looking for better parts for my creature, doesn’t really matter where I stuff them. 7/10

Tribal stage: So, I need hats, masks, armour and bags. And then off we go, to kill/convert our neighbors. Ooh, a music mini minigame! 6/10

Civilization stage: Cool, we get cars! Oh, I have to build a town now? And a factory. And an entertainment center. Ooh, boats. I wonder what my creatures looked like. Oh look, there’s a giant one converting all of my cities by firing music at them. 4/10

Space: HOLY SH*T, it’s HUGE! Oh what, I have to do what for you now? I thought I got to play with tractor beams and just torment all life in the universe foreve- COLONY UNDER ATTACK! Score pending, but 9/10 for letting me have a space Trireme.

It’s great, and it’s not. I doesn’t have enough focus on your creature and how it works for me, and I’d have loved all of the early stages to have been twice as long and just a little deeper.

I disliked the fact the little creature you spend time creating becomes irrelevant as soon as you hit the civ section. Just made it all a useless time sink as far as the total gameplay is concerned.

I also disliked the fact that in the civ game none of the parts have any impact on gameplay … which is a complete reversal of the prior game. Whereas choosing one hand or mouth had a direct (though often minor) impact on the gameplay now you can create vehicles with any parts and none make the slightest difference, they all move at the same speed and have the same fire animations regardless of what you put on them. It’s all just a cosmetic skin with zero game depth.

They could have kept some consistency with the general game mechanic where choices actualy mean something, just seemed they skimped out on the whole civ game which could have been done much better. Sure we can make a custom town hall and house but you cant change the function at all, just another pointless time sink which just like the original creature is promptly irrelevant as soon as your done with the civ phase.

A very disjointed and unsatisfying progression of game elements IMO. Has some fun in it for sure but very over-hyped for what it actualy delivers.

Too late to cancel my preorder, so I will find out tomorrow.