By Jim Rossignol on September 10th, 2008 at 7:58 am.
Blogchums Videogaming247 have spotted that a Creationist blogger has started his own campaign against the evil of Will Wright’s game. No DRM quibbles here though, it’s all about the religious implications:
You would think that as a member of the Episcopal Church, a smart man like Will Wright would not be capable of creating Spore. However, we must be reminded that the Episcopal Church is the only church in america that ordains homosexuals on a regular basis.
It makes sense that a perverted church would cause a man to make the creations he has in this game. It just may be that evolution is not the only thing to fear this game teaching your children.
Yes. For more such insights, visit Anti Spore.
10/09/2008 at 08:01 piphil says:
*Ignores link, moves on to next story*
10/09/2008 at 08:12 Fashigady says:
“It just may be that evolution is not the only thing to fear this game teaching your children”
I seriously hope that no one is going to try and learn about evolution from Spore
10/09/2008 at 08:20 Bema says:
Hahaha! This has to be a fake…surely?! No-one could troll that well otherwise?
The Anti-Spore site is a comic goldmine. :D
10/09/2008 at 08:22 MeestaNob! says:
God loves all his children. Even the giant CockMonsters (in reference to Spore creatures, not Christians. Clearly.).
10/09/2008 at 08:22 Dray says:
Good ol’ religion eh? What a happy bunch some of them are.
10/09/2008 at 08:28 Heliocentric says:
but spore rejects evolution in favour of intelligent (or stupid) design.
*Mutters*
10/09/2008 at 08:47 Nemolom says:
The world is a sad place to live in at times.
10/09/2008 at 08:54 Heliocentric says:
sites a spoof. Not by ea, but a joke just the same.
10/09/2008 at 08:55 simbo says:
I wondered how long it would take for this stuff to come out, although I was expecting the pro-Intelligent Design lobby to use this to prove the existence of their
scientific theoriesbeliefs. Obviously now involving higher beings playing computer games.10/09/2008 at 09:07 Meat Circus says:
I’m sorry, this is just a Guerilla Marketing exercise by EA. We’re not falling for it. OH NO.
10/09/2008 at 09:07 Dreamhacker says:
I, for one, welcome our flying spaghetti monster overlord!
I also await the reaction from the church of the FSM.
10/09/2008 at 09:09 Okami says:
Site’s a fake. There’s just not enough hate and vitriol on there…
10/09/2008 at 09:10 Muzman says:
I’m going to call Poe’s Law early on this one.
If it was more heavily cross linked with the christian community and the guy(?) was laying his god cred on the table like they usually do I’d be more inclined to believe it. But he didn’t even say his prayers caused the stock to go down.
10/09/2008 at 09:12 The adjudicator says:
sorry guys, piphil already won this thread.
10/09/2008 at 09:23 hidden_7 says:
I was going to make a joke about how, as an atheist, I’m offended by the Intelligent Design demonstrated in Spore, but 1) somebody beat me to it, and 2) what happens in Spore isn’t even really ID. It’s definitely not Darwin Evolution, but ID has everything being created all at once by a designer (remember kids, ID is just creationism with some psuedo-logic smacked onto it) whereas this you intelligently evolve your creature over time based on like… point constraints? No real analogue there…
10/09/2008 at 09:24 Death by Toast says:
WOW
all i have to say…WOW
10/09/2008 at 09:24 Jim Rossignol says:
(It does look like a hoax.)
10/09/2008 at 09:28 ScornfulPanda says:
And if it isn’t a hoax it’s best ignored.
10/09/2008 at 09:35 Esha says:
I think it’s a bit of a leg-pulling too, to me it looks more like the kind of thing that The G4E Conglomeration* kicks out on a daily basis. You know, for their “epic lulz”. Kids these days.
It’s basically just someone trying to see how many people they can annoy in every camp. Christians will get annoyed because fakes like this make them look like complete gimps, and the internet everyday will get annoyed because they won’t look too closely and they’ll think that Religion is trying to force things upon them again (likely with the end result of getting a product banned).
I can’t see this being real, just the same as none of the flame-happy God/Christian sites are real, they’re pretty much all piss-takes so some sod can have a laugh. Which is sad really but that’s far more believable than anything else.
I have to admit though, the site even irked me a little with the jab at gay folk. I have a very good gay Christian friend who hates seeing crap like that, it’s just going to be depressing for him. Whomever is responsible should… I don’t know, seek counselling? Not for being a religious nutjob, but for putting so much effort into the faking thereof.
* Goons, 4Chan, and Encyclopedia Dramatica – the cesspit of humanity.
10/09/2008 at 09:44 Biscuitry says:
Honestly, the whole thing looks far too professional to be real. I think it’s a good parody, though.
10/09/2008 at 09:52 Naurgul says:
I’m pretty sure the best thing to do in cases like this is to ignore them. So, I’m doing the same thing as piphil and won’t follow the link.
If it’s a joke, then I guess it’s alright… kinda.
10/09/2008 at 09:52 Flubb says:
If he really was Christian, he wouldn’t be posting links to all the depravity :)
10/09/2008 at 10:26 Smee says:
@Flubb: Don’t count on it.
http://www.ep.tc/problems/28/15.html
(alright, not the best example, but one of the funniest)
10/09/2008 at 10:42 Bobsy says:
Capital letters on Episcopalian Church but not on america? No self-respecting Bible Belter would write like that.
10/09/2008 at 10:45 Stuart W says:
I’m inclined to believe it is a hoax but regardless of that it does cut rather close to what creationists say.
10/09/2008 at 11:06 Arnulf says:
Spore is really a good mirror for (against?) the creationist movement. Matters not if that site is a hoax. Spore is proof that creationism and intelligent design is just wrong somehow.
Now that Mr Wright has apparently offended both creationists and atheists, what’s still left? And more importantly, how was that possible in the first place?
Seems that games are a serious way to offend and thus constitute art in its modern, err, post-modern form.
10/09/2008 at 11:07 sigma83 says:
I glanced through, and my satire button lit up like a Christmas tree.
10/09/2008 at 11:08 mrmud says:
It is either a hoax or a very misguided person (not only misguided by believing in creationism, but also in complaining about spore when the game is closer to an ID sim than evolution).
10/09/2008 at 11:08 Primar says:
Hoax or not, things like this always make me sad. Not so much due to the owner of the blog’s posts (amusing as they are), but more the comments it recieves from everybody who disagrees.
Seriously, are you unable to voice your opinion in a way that actually has some merit, and doesn’t resort to “ur rong lol” (or worse, “ur gay/stupid/[insultgoeshere]“)? If so, don’t post. You’re just making everybody else look bad.
Although I suppose that’s more a problem with the internet as a whole, rather than this blog in particular.
10/09/2008 at 11:12 The Sombrero Kid says:
if these nut’s are correct and we were designed itelligently then spore has shown that theres a 90% chance we are a convincing replica of god’s cock except twice as big you know to make him look cool to the ladieeees
10/09/2008 at 11:16 Tikey says:
Well… Will Wright is evil, at least they got that right.
10/09/2008 at 11:34 Jay says:
Will Wright stated that he decided he was an atheist when he was primary school. OH DEAR CREATIONISTS
Just because you’re a member of a
cultreligion, doesn’t mean you’re personally religious – I’m catholic and couldn’t give a toss about religion10/09/2008 at 11:50 Dorian Cornelius Jasper says:
This must be a hoax. Must.
10/09/2008 at 11:52 Jesucristo says:
I believe in Legolas and Jedi Knights. I think I have to create a blog against Call of Duty.
Those creacionist are retards.
10/09/2008 at 12:33 Jay says:
How ironic
10/09/2008 at 12:38 Okami says:
@Jesuscristo: How can you believe in Legolas and the Jedi? That’s blasphemy of the highest order! Everybody who knows anything knows that only one completely fictional fantasy world with absolutely no relation to reality can be true! Just ask a catholic, or a protestant, or a muslim or…
10/09/2008 at 13:05 PJ says:
most amusing. wonder if EA did it? :D
10/09/2008 at 13:39 The Hammer says:
Hahaha, oh man. This is awesome. Have you seen the size of the comments threads on the site? Massive!
Haha.
Whether or not this is hoax or not is irrelevant. It’s a gold-mine of funnies all the same! Thanks, RPS!
10/09/2008 at 13:43 Thomas Lawrence says:
The one thing I was pleased about, in terms of Spore and actual evolution, is that every time you make changes to your creature, it does actually involve breeding and a new generation being born. This is superior to the often seen pseudo-Lamarckian “evolution” in games with similar themes, where the creature literally changes on the spot, growing new limbs or whatever.
However it’s rather undermined by the way that all the other creatures around you appear to spontaneously morph while you’re in the egg.
The timescale presented is good too, although it’s unclear exactly how it maps to game time. But it does at least correctly describe the billions of years involved to evolve from a cell to a complicated creature.
Everything else is nothing like actual evolution.
10/09/2008 at 13:48 The Hammer says:
Incidentally, bringing Jack Thompson into it sort of ruined the fun a bit… YAWN.
10/09/2008 at 14:15 ChristopherHitchens says:
Anything that can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.
And, no. This is likely not a hoax. Christians really are that stupid. Circular reasoning combined with self-proclaimed immunity to criticism or any opposing viewpoint makes dangerous zealots.
“If you gave Falwell an enema, you could bury him in a matchbox.”
[not actually Hitch]
10/09/2008 at 14:18 Ginger Yellow says:
I’ve always thought a proper evolutionary God game would be pretty cool. Changes you make to the phsyical landscape would affect the fitness landscape, resulting in adaptive changes to the populations present. The computational requirements would be pretty intense, however, especially if you wanted it to be pleasant to look at, and it would be rather goalless.
10/09/2008 at 14:21 Sucram says:
I’m personally outraged by the anti-Darwin, anti-science stance Spore takes.
The organism that emerges from the meteor is far too complex to survive the harshness to space travel and where did that organism come from in the first place. Why doesn’t the Spore allow me to start as a replicating molecule?
Complex eyes appear out of nowhere and a huge opportunity is missed in the creature stage to present the perspective of the life form. Why don’t we get to see why as a herbivore it might be beneficial to have eyes on the sides of your head.
And what happened to the common ancestors, as I emerged from the primordial sludge I encountered a dinosaur, a chair, a helicopter and a robot. Now if I had seen a chair, a sofa, a chez lounge and a flying ottoman I would have understood. As it stands this game is an insult to all human logic and reason.
10/09/2008 at 15:00 zeh says:
Whatever. Spore is a Creationist/ID believer’s wet dream anyway. It’s not about evolution at all – your characters never evolve by themselves – it’s about designing your creatures ID-style.
10/09/2008 at 15:01 scaredboy says:
Remember these people are real and they are a large group of American and they all vote the same.
10/09/2008 at 15:26 Okami says:
Strictly speaking, Creationism and ID are not the same thing.
ID is the stance taken by the catholic church these days, ie evolution exists, but it was actually all initiated by the god and follows some sort of divine plan. Creationists believe that the earth is 6000 years old and was created in 7 days by their god and that dinosaurs and humans lived together before the flood.
Kinda like Dino Riders, but without all the lasers and bad guys with animal heads.
10/09/2008 at 15:33 Nimic says:
Anyone who says Spore is more like Intelligent Design than Evolution is wrong. And by that I mean real, actual Intelligent Design as the ‘theory’ (and I shame myself by using that word) is presented, now what you think it sounds like. For obvious reasons it’s impossible to create a game that is completely true to evolution, as you wouldn’t really have any say in it. Spore is basically a good analogy, with the time scale included if not directly obvious in the game.
Spore isn’t evolution in that you get to choose what to add, but you add stuff based on which challenges your creature faces, and you can’t add everything you want. But it isn’t ID just because you appear to ‘intelligently design’ the creature, there’s a lot more to the ‘theory’ than that (albeit most of it is still hilariously wrong).
10/09/2008 at 15:33 colinmarc says:
I like the blatant misunderstanding of user-created content, posting the sporn videos.
10/09/2008 at 15:57 Ginger Yellow says:
“ID is the stance taken by the catholic church these days, ie evolution exists, but it was actually all initiated by the god and follows some sort of divine plan.”
No it isn’t. That’s (one type of) theistic evolution. ID, to the extent it has any content at all, is based on the assertion that evolution cannot explain certain features of life (and in an expanded sense that “chance and regularity” can’t explain certain features of the universe).
10/09/2008 at 16:07 theleif says:
This game is an abomination, and here is the proof!
“But all in the seas or in the rivers that do not have fins and scales, all that move in the water or any living thing which is in the water, they are an abomination to you.” (Leviticus 11:10)
“They shall be an abomination to you; you shall not eat their flesh, but you shall regard their carcasses as an abomination.” (Leviticus 11:11)
“Whatever in the water does not have fins or scales; that shall be an abomination to you.” (Leviticus 11:12)
I’m pretty certain that you can eat things from the sea that does not have fins or scales in the game.
Horrible.. If Will was a good christian he would abhor crabs as much as i do.
Godless, i tell you!
10/09/2008 at 16:10 Kommissar Nicko says:
I’d have to go with Muzman about the God-cred. There’s not nearly enough interconnectedness to substantiate this person. They’d be whipping out prayer circles at x-place, candlelight vigils with their pastor at y-zone, and talking all about how pious all the people are in z-land.
10/09/2008 at 16:24 Bonedancer says:
Definitely a joke, but I liked this bit:
“Someone informed me that an Attorney, Mr. Jack Thompson may be able to help me. As he has had much success in raising awareness about problem video games.
Does anyone know how I can get in touch with him?
Turns out that Jack Thompson is a terrible lawyer.
People are emailing me so much stuff, I don’t know which people are being sincere and which are not.”
10/09/2008 at 17:05 Noc says:
My favorite part:
Whether this is a hoax or not, this is gold.
[Edit: DAMNIT, Bonedancer. Also: Ooh, post editing is shiny, now. And it's got a ticking clock.]
10/09/2008 at 17:19 NateN says:
99% sure it’s a hoax. Why?
1. If you do a whois, you’ll note that the the DNS is hosted by a company that hosts a fair amount of porn. (killhost.com) An odd choice for a Christian family values blogger.
2. If you do some checking to see who uses killhost.com’s DNS servers, and then go view source on some of those porn sites, you’ll note they are using Google analytics to track site views. If you go to antispore.com and view source, you’ll note that he’s using the same Google analytics account to track site views on that site as well.
I’m not mentioning any porn sites here to keep this all SFW, do your own googling :-P. But clicking “Shared” on one of the the links below is a good place to start.
http://www.robtex.com/dns/antispore.com.html
http://www.robtex.com/dns/ns1.killhost.com.html
(The Google analytics account is UA-297894, anti-spore is profile number 9. So on antispore, the full string is UA-297894-9 in the source, on some of the other sites it’ll be UA-297894-X, where X = any number.)
None of this is a smoking gun of course, but it all looks really off when you add it all up.
10/09/2008 at 17:47 JonFitt says:
“However, we must be reminded that the Episcopal Church is the only church in america that ordains homosexuals on a regular basis.”
Laughed, I nearly cried.
To chime in with what others have said, I have found the pointers to ID in Spore to be a bit grating.
10/09/2008 at 18:52 Bob Arctor says:
My religious vehicle was a Jesus Christ on cross on tracks with a loudspeaker coming out his chest.
That is all.
11/09/2008 at 01:51 Bahumat says:
I’m so confused! Should I hate this game for the DRM, or love it because it makes creationists froth?
11/09/2008 at 10:04 ripclaw says:
I’m quite sure this is either someone’s attempt at irony or a marketing stunt. The way it is written makes sure to push all the right buttons to get gamers’ blood boiling, e.g. mentioning Jack Thompson. Still, somewhat entertaining though.
11/09/2008 at 14:22 Dreaded Walrus says:
The majority of us already knew it was a hoax, but for those that didn’t, this confirms it:
http://antispore.com/2008/09/11/understand-my-beliefs-please/
“But the Bible teaches us that God was not done with man. For we were His creation and He then spoke to Noah in Genesis 8:21-27 after the flood. “21. The LORD smelled the pleasing aroma and said in his heart: “Never again will I curse the ground because of man, even though every inclination of his heart is evil from childhood. And never gonna give you up. 22. “Never gonna let you down.” 23.”Never gonna run around and desert you.” 24. “Never gonna make you cry.” 25. “Never gonna say goodbye.” 26. “Never gonna tell a lie and hurt you.” 27.”Never truly believe anything you read on the Internet. There will always be cases of Poe’s Law.””
Notice also the mention of Poe’s Law.
Poe’s Law: “Without a blatant display of humour, it is impossible to tell the difference between religious Fundamentalism and a parody thereof.”
11/09/2008 at 18:19 Velt says:
Don’t give this guys website any publicity.
The guy isn’t half as much of an ignorant tool if he gets money for pissing people off.
Even clicking the link to his site makes him money, if you think it’s stupid don’t even go on his site.
12/09/2008 at 20:32 BarkingDog says:
No, actually do go there and read the last post, especially the ending quotes.
whoever made that blog is made of epix and win.
Best Rickroll in all of… creation.