Spore Creatures

Spore Creatures is a spin-off of Spore, developed by Griptonite Games and published by Electronic Arts, in which a player controls and evolves a creature of their creation. It is a science fiction adventure game.

Plot

The game begins as a new species of creatures, the Oogies, are born on the planet Tapti. Two members of this species of particular importance are the protagonist, simply known as 'Oogie', and Little Oogie, a small and primitive creature. A mysterious spaceship is flying around the planet, abducting various creatures; it captures Little Oogie and flies away. Oogie pursues the ship all over Tapti, and when it begins to fall apart after bashing into a number of objects, Oogie collects its pieces. Oogie eventually catches up with the ship as it finally crashes, and its pilot, an alien called Gar'skuther, clambers out. Gar'skuther simply summons a new ship and flies away, still in possession of Little Oogie, who has now grown a strange tentacle from his back. Oogie uses the parts he has collected to rebuild the first ship and pursue Gar'skuther through the galaxy.

On one planet, Oogie eventually comes across Gar'skuther, who is observing another creature. Seeing no threat in Oogie, he begins to explain his plan: he wishes to dominate the galaxy by experimenting on all primitive wildlife and building his genes into them - his genes cause large, dark tentacles to grow from whatever they are implanted into. In order to show Oogie his power, Gar'skuther infects a nearby creature, and pits it against Oogie to test its strength. Oogie defeats the creature, but Gar' skuther flees, now realising that Oogie may be more than just a normal creature.

Oogie eventually lands his ship on Gar'skuther's base planet, where he is hiding through a cave. After resolving a conflict between two native species and helping to cure a nest from the infection, Oogie reaches the cave entrance. Passing through it, Oogie comes to a small cove where Gar'skuther is waiting. The evil alien tells Oogie that he is more powerful than he originally thought, and that he will face him in battle if Oogie can defeat the Skuther - a bionic creature Gar'skuther has built using the best parts of many other species. Oogie defeats the Skuther, but Gar'skuther reveals that he has spread them all over the galaxy and that they will soon become the dominant species. Gar'skuther then proceeds to battle Oogie, but is defeated and dies, his arm is the only salvagable part left.

Upon Gar'skuther's defeat, the many Skuthers throughout the galaxy collapse. The infection ceases to exist as the tentacles all wither away. Oogie takes the spaceship back to Tapti, where he meets a cured Little Oogie. The two creatures then carry out their lives on Tapti as a dominant, yet peaceful, species. A cutscene then shows that a creature native to Tapti called a Meeper finds the spacecraft, enters it, and flies away to an unknown planet.

Gameplay

Gameplay screenshot.

The game focuses on the Creature phase of the larger game, with elements of Nintendogs and Drawn to Life. Spore Creatures characters are ball and line generated 2.5D. Unlike the characters of Spore, creatures are completely 2D,^[2][3] but the environments remain 3D.

The iPhone version is unrelated to the DS version; the environment is 2D, similar to Spore Origins for iPhone.

Spore Creatures is a more story-based game as the game is played as an Oogie. Another Oogie creature (named Little Oogie) is kidnapped by a UFO inhabited by an evil scientist creature named Gar'skuther, and the player is forced to survive on strange islands over the course of 12 levels. The creature is created and modified in an editor, using points earned to give the creature different body parts and skills. The player is given 20 points at the start with which to build their initial creature. This is not true for the iPhone version; it is completely different.^[2]

The game focuses on survival, which includes finding food, with mini-games such as cuddling and dancing for friend-making.^[4] A large part of the game involves collecting items, allowing players to earn 60 badges based on game moments and actions. The players can also perform side quests and play mini-games to unlock skills and 280 hidden creature parts, which are given to the player by other friendly creatures, akin to Animal Crossing.^[2][4] Some parts grant "Bio-Powers", such as a quick healing ability or flame-breath.^[4]

Combat consists of the player initiating the fight with another creature by selecting it to go into a one-on-one combat screen in which the creatures face off against each other.^[5]

The Nintendo DS version of the Sporepedia resembles and functions more like Pokémon's Pokédex than that used in the main version of Spore.^[5]

Creature abilities

In Spore Creatures there are a multitude of parts to collect. Certain parts grant the creature special abilities called "bio-powers". However, these bio-powers induce several catches (i.e. stun causes poor eyesight). The bio-powers are: Flame Jet, Leaf Flurry, Quick Healing, Stun, and Force Field. Flame Jet and Leaf Flurry are both offensive bio-powers that damage enemies in combat; Stun momentarily paralyzes the enemy, disabling it from attacking; Quick Healing and Force Field are defensive bio-powers that heals the creature and its friends, and creates an invulnerable bubble around creature, respectively. Some legs also grant terrain walking abilities. There are six types hazardous terrains: Poison, lava, thorny, icy, deep water and hot sand. There is no leg part that allows the creature to walk in poison, but there is a cheat available on the cheat menu that enables users this ability.

Species

Multiplayer

The game allowed the player to save thirty-one different creations, including those from friends over a local, peer-to-peer connection. Players were able to have their creatures interact via the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection; Spore Creatures were one of the few Nintendo DS or Wii games to allow a player to opt out of needing to input Friend Codes.^[3] The online multiplayer was closed on June 30, 2014.

Reception

Reception
Review scores Publication Score DS iOS Destructoid 4/10[6] N/A EGM C+[7] N/A Eurogamer 5/10[8] N/A Famitsu 29/40[9] N/A GameSpot 6.5/10[10] N/A GameSpy [11] N/A IGN 7.8/10[12] N/A NGamer 60%[13] N/A Nintendo Power 8/10[14] N/A ONM 66%[15] N/A Aggregate scores GameRankings 67%[16] 64%[17] Metacritic 65/100[18] N/A

The DS version received "mixed" reviews according to the review aggregation website Metacritic.^[18] In Japan, Famitsu gave it a score of one six, one seven, and two eights for a total of 29 out of 40.^[9]

IGN said, "The adventure is lengthy with tons of achievements to shoot for. The creature creator might not be as elaborate as PC Spore, but there's still a ton you can do to make some bizarre organisms."^[12] Eurogamer, however, panned the game in its review, stating that the game ignored what made Spore special, and that the "imaginative and sociable sandbox game feels like an afterthought, stuck in an uninspiring cycle of fetch-quests and grinding."^[8] Official Nintendo Magazine said that progress in stages always requires specific body traits, forcing the player to constantly edit their creature, and removing the whole point in the game.^[15] It was a nominee for Best Simulation Game for the Nintendo DS from IGN in their 2008 video game awards.^[19]

See also

• Spore
• Spore Origins
• Nintendogs

References

• "Spore makes you God" Article in tech newspaper Metro Tech

External links

• Spore Creatures (Nintendo DS) at MobyGames
• Official website
• Developer site
• Talking to producer of Spore Creatures about the DS game's start in life

Sim video games
SimCity series	Main games SimCity (1989) SimCity 2000 SimCity 3000 SimCity 4 Rush Hour SimCity (2013) Other games SimCity 64 SimCity DS SimCity Societies Destinations Snap City SimCity DS 2 SimCity Creator SimCity Social Other The Card Game The SimCity Box
The Sims series	Main games The Sims Soundtrack The Sims 2 Stuff packs The Sims 3 Stuff packs The Sims 4 Stuff packs List of games Other games The Sims Online The Sims Life Stories The Sims Pet Stories The Sims Castaway Stories The Sims FreePlay The Sims Medieval The Sims Social MySims MySims MySims Kingdom MySims Party MySims Racing MySims Agents MySims SkyHeroes
Spore	Expansions Galactic Adventures Spin-offs Creature Creator Creatures Origins Hero Hero Arena Darkspore Other Development
Sim	SimEarth SimAnt SimLife SimFarm SimRefinery SimTower SimHealth SimIsle SimTown SimPark SimGolf SimTunes Sim Theme Park SimCopter Streets of SimCity SimSafari SimsVille Sid Meier's SimGolf SimMars SimAnimals
Related articles	Electronic Arts Maxis Simlish The Sims Studio Will Wright Ben Bell Rawson Stovall A-Train City-building game Lincity OpenCity Cities XL Cities: Skylines Yoot Tower The Tower SP Mod The Sims BeyondSims The Strangerhood
Category