We must, as consumers, demand that purchased goods, even software and other semi-intangible goods, be treated a true purchase - clear and free of any attachments to the original manufacturer. DRM violates that fundamental nature of a purchase, and chains the item back to another entity that must be consulted in order to determine if one is still allowed to use one's purchase, or whether the right has been revoked.

What will eventually happen is someone will go to play their game - such as SPORE, in 3 or 5 years from now, and will find that they cannot due to the fact that EA (or whomever) had discontinued their DRM server - and thus made it impossible for anyone to lawfully play the game that they ostensibly purchased.

This fight needs to be fought, so that the legality of this can be settled by our culture.

Clearly, most people are deeply disturbed by the notion that they are being told that they are purchasing software, only to have the actual terms of that purchase turn out to look an awful lot more like a rental - with all of the rights being retained by the seller, with none given the buyer - including the inability to sell the purchase to a 3rd party.

DRM is wrong. Piracy is wrong. But two wrongs do not make a right.

I have AMD 2500+ 1,5GB ram and ATI 9600pro (1024x768). Only where I have noticed slowing down on graphics is the first 'EA/spore' video before "start game screen". And the game still looks nice.

Also commenting the article where no "space-phase were seen": I first thought that there were the thing when game really changed, my planet almost got destroyed and really was fighting my race to live.. 

After one more 6h play I got the logic of the space generation, and still think that there's where the game actually begins because all first 4 phases were really easy on the normal level.

but be careful when entering the space, if some war mongers are present remember to repair your homeplanets every city after every attack.. and that has been road to victory.. (repearing damaged cities are BTW boring!)

... crack but not as expensive, first go got to "city mode" before I got itchy to start over.

Second go got to space age in one sitting, there is an achievement for that btw.

The reason its better than the sims, you know people spent hours, possibly DAYS building their lil critters and posting them online, and your winged, acid spitting, shark toothed, clawing monster and his buddies are ripping them limb from limb.

As for the DRM, I don't care, whenever my machine craps out I reinstall and tell Home Server to rebuild the system and restore all the programs, it got around Mass Effects DRM, it will get around this one too :) 


"By Charlie Demerjian:

That is as much a testament to ATI"

Hmmmm, your biased reporting skills arn't showing through at all, charlie.

Why don't you write up an article on how the newer ATI cards get up to a bajillion degrees celsius under load?

BTW, my integrated nvidia video chip plays spore better (and cooler) than your ATI.

Hi Charlie,
I know that you're a deadly enemy of Vista DRM. How comes it that you like the Spore DRM? Why does your review not mention this properly?
When you buy Spore you can only install it 3 times, after this point you should call EA and you're totally at their mercy. So this is NOT a buy, this is a RENTAL game. With the infamous Securom DRM virus: No uninstall, ressourcestealing, no control, always problems. If lost hours with Securom on other occasions. Only reformatting the HD gets rid of it.
I'm really tired of EA and I never will buy this DRM crappy rental game.

I tried spore the other day and it plays just like those japanese toys called tamaguchi's, you know, the small electronic toys where you feed a pet to keep it alive, only Spore is a bit more advanced. 

As a game it sucks though. It gets boring fast and you have to invent incentives to keep playing with the toy, but in the end it's not worth the time or money. Pity, because so much time and effort has been spent on making it. :/

Last I heard, Spore had some draconian DRM in it. Does anyone know what it has? Hopefully not some rootkit.

Now that's a first for me; the venerable ST box mentioned in a 2008 next-gen game review.

Can I have pretty charts with 'em ? thank you.

Hmm I just can't help to think that creationists will think this is hell spawn. Evolving??? what's that, us mere humans can't play god .... does look like a cool game and nice to know that the game plays on almost anything.... heck I bet even my MSI Wind might be able to get it going :D.

Cheers

Well,
I have to agree. I have never been a fan of the sims at all. However, this game has a twist which makes me laugh and enjoy the game. Different style of gameplay, using a different side of my brain makes it quite stimulating to say the least.

You forgot to mention the DRM in this game, it has the same SecuROM Mass Effect has.

Enjoy the 3 limited installs before you have to beg EA support for the right to play a game you PAID for.

This game was cracked before it was released in the US. DRM = waste of time

Does it run well on your nvidia cards Charlie? or have they all caught fire yet?

Some how I missed hearing about this game up until now. Sounds interesting as a casual gamer this is just the type of game I like. But I did a search to see what others think. 

Sony SecuROM crap? Only 3 installs?
Oh well I guess I'll keep my $50.

If they choose to support and develope the game it could improve quite a lot. I assume that is the general idea, certainly its what Will Wright did with the Sims and made fun games people like to play that also pay for themselves (and then some).

However to put the cat among the pigeons, Maxis strength (ongoing support and game development) is or perhaps was EA's weak point and it will be interesting to see who wins the philosophical battle between EA and Maxis.

When you look at games like Sims and another example is Sword of the Stars (a tongue-in-cheek galactic 4X strategy game) which deserves a mention you see a model which starkly contrasts EA's previous attitude which gained EA a reputation which John Riccitielo said he would try to live down.

Sword of the Stars producers Kerberos (plug) have just produced and are about to release A Murder of Crows (plug plug), a second expansion to SotS. Between expansions several patches have each added functionality as well as fixing bugs. This is a far cry from EA's "floggit and leggit" approach earlier this century to various titles which suffered from poor post release support and caused many gamers myself included to regard all EA titles with considerable suspicion. 

The sense of post release support is that it expands the fanbase with good support rather than hype, which in turn encourages word of mouth recommendation which is a fact of marketing on the web and further capitalises on the enthusiasm of the players by offering them more of what they want. A simple economic model of quid pro quo which EA seemed previously unable to adopt due to the misrule induced by placing accounting at the top of the corporate agenda. An object lesson for media publishers on how not to manage your empire (there's a game in that somewhere).

Wasn't there an 80s 16-bit game with an almost identical concept? I think it was called Eco by Ocean Software.

Only if I could install this more than three times. -_-

Haha, you have a rootkit on your PC now. That's why I'm not going to buy it, although I want to.

Charl, did you try Ultimate64? maybe bit of overpower would fall into use?

Seen lots of EA advertising on TV lately, At least they have Full Catalog of STUFF Built. Isn't that what stuck on Nameplaque: S.P.O.R.? something about being Shek.

Just Like Microscope with Love Battles.
drashek