Topic: Is spore too cartoony?

[WhiteWolf7]

I mean seriously guys, you are telling me those are hyper realistic or more realistic textures then now?

it's never been an issue about hyper realistic graphics if you had managed to comprehend what people have been saying.

Oh really? what it been about then?. *waits patiently*

[nickmcdoz]

My complaint is the new added videogameness. It totally took away from the experience of watching the game. The large icons everywhere, the multiple acid spitting monsters, the big ability things on the side of the screen, the lack of more realistic and less fast creatures on the screen, the stupid background of the editor, the "impossible" sporepedia creatures.

That's exactly what I had been thinking lately. It used to seem like a game about exploring. You were able to explore the world, discover new things, and enjoy looking at things. Now it seems to be all about playing a video game. It looks like it's all about interacting with other creatures, fighting, eating, surviving, constantly running from other creatures, which I don't really think leaves you much time to actually just walk around and enjoy the view. You have to focus too much on how you are going to play. I liked how few buttons there were, so you focused mostly just on the creature (I thought Will had said once that he wanted an almost buttonless view... but now the whole bottom of the screen is crammed with buttons). Now it seems like you have to think on what parts you are going to use or else you won't survive, or be able to pick fruits, or whatever, instead of just enjoying making your creature. I really liked the feel of the 2005 demo.

EXACTLY! IT's the BUTTONS!
And if you agree with me on this, dont you agree with me that the new sporepedia is a deprovement from what we last saw? I'm just not half as excited for it anymore. And to think I thought graphics were nothing, I'm a Wii fan and PS3 hater, but with this I realise its not the details of the graphics, its the way they are presented. The cards don't look like cards to me. Not with some 3D creature rotating on it. It was much cooler when you just got a snap of the creature, just one view, it was a real, tangible card, and it made you want to see it in action. Its not as cool. In fact I'm not in the least excited for it. The 3Dness takes away from it because it doesn't feel like I can go up to the screen and peel the card off the screen and really have it in my hand, and then go through outerspace to find what this card really represented, what this little 2D picture was like in real life.

EDIT: Taking this post and putting it in a Poll to see who likes what.

[Lualmoba]

Finally someone replied to that post!

I don't want to say anything about the Sporepedia yet since we don't really know much about it. And it seems to be fairly similar to the one before, even if the look has changed a bit.

But what really is bothering me are those huge buttons everywhere. *shivers*

Edit: Woot, I'm leet!

Edit: Now I'm not.

[ChristianSkunk]

Finally someone replied to that post!

I don't want to say anything about the Sporepedia yet since we don't really know much about it. And it seems to be fairly similar to the one before, even if the look has changed a bit.

But what really is bothering me are those huge buttons everywhere. *shivers*

Edit: Woot, I'm leet!

Don't make another post or you'll lose it!

[DaMuncha]

What gets me is, who on earth gave you the idea that "these creatures are too cartoony" or "the eyes on the creatures are way too big now" i mean, hello? the creatures are made by the players. They only look cartoony cause the player who made that creature made it look like that. You can also purge unwanted creatures from your universe and and the game fits to the style that you play as. If you dont want a creature that has big eyes and hands and looks to bright and cute, then dont create it like that.

[The_Kev]

I think you are right, but the textures play a role too.

[WhiteWolf7]

You know whats a good example of cartooney. The upcoming empire earth 3.

Look at shots of it. Spore is not THAT cartoony

[darkrayboy]

I really like the look of spore now, if you look back at last years screens and stuff, you see when your ufo is was really close to a city how ugly the graphics looked. Now it is looking so damn good, and cartoony maby a little bit but i like it, you will make everything so you can make your creatures realistic (2 arms and 2 legs for example) or really cartoony( A nose on his ass) no spore is just great, really really great

[The_Kev]

Does a nose on his ass make the creature cartoony? I don't think so, look, if I have a super realisctic dragon like creature, with a nose on his ass, it ain't cartoony.

[ChristianSkunk]

What gets me is, who on earth gave you the idea that "these creatures are too cartoony" or "the eyes on the creatures are way too big now" i mean, hello? the creatures are made by the players. They only look cartoony cause the player who made that creature made it look like that. You can also purge unwanted creatures from your universe and and the game fits to the style that you play as. If you dont want a creature that has big eyes and hands and looks to bright and cute, then dont create it like that.

Well, Will and the developers themselves say that they made it cartoony.  Granted, the "too" part is in the eye of the beholder.  It was in one of the DICE videos about how at first it was really realistic, and you could make a dog that really looked like a dog, but it wouldn't walk like a dog, and it was very disconcerting.  So, to paraphrase Ocean, they made it cartoony to cover up their failings.

[Lurker28]

Well, Will and the developers themselves say that they made it cartoony.  Granted, the "too" part is in the eye of the beholder.  It was in one of the DICE videos about how at first it was really realistic, and you could make a dog that really looked like a dog, but it wouldn't walk like a dog, and it was very disconcerting.  So, to paraphrase Ocean, they made it cartoony to cover up their failings.

Not necessarily fails, just the lack of technology to go that far. Will and his team have already gone 5+ years in this technology that no one else has, they literally had to advise it way beyond its years. Yes, I will say some of the procedural animations now piss me off however, it is such an ambitious game I am hoping that in the future because of this game they will be able to amplify what Will and his team have done today.

It has always been cartoon like, ever since the GDC videos. I really think all you guys were smoking something when you viewed the blurry low quality 05 video. Seriously, they have already mentioned this a year or so again at E3...the decision to go for a "lighter" aesthetic was made long before the game even went public.

[Dr. Croccer]

Will probably tried to make Spore more cartoony so more people (of the younger audience) would like it. A game with hoppers and willosaurs hopping around in a forest looks better for most people than Xenomorphs ripping eachothers heads of in a dark, desolate world.

Also, The cartoony-ish style = Will's style. The Moose-cow hybrids and Fish things with maces on their tails looked more realistic (well..)
than the Willosaurs and Screebles. And they were made by other guys from Maxis. And remember the huge spider things from GDC 2005?
'Nothing friendly about them. And Will's city in the GDC 2005 video was cartoony, but the other city was far more realistic.

[SBD]

at first the new cartoonyness annoyed me, but now i think i can live with it. I don't see why i can't laugh at this game to enjoy it.

[Woulfe]

How I see this issue.....

1. Too realistic = less sales to the general public
2. Too cartoony = less sales to rabid gamers
3. Something in-between = equal sales to both

I think they're trying to get a balance between the two, but so far all we've seen is the cartoony side, which is to aim it at the large casual gamer market. (the same one that bought The Sims namely.)

Needless to say I'm certain with the editors you can go both ways in designing your stuff, you can make something uber realistic or ultra cartoony or something in-between. (up to you namely.)

- W -
* my $0.02 *

[Dr. Croccer]

There are some realistic sides to Spore: i.e. blood that appears near a dead creature, the Tribal age battles (none showed so far but confirmed) Tanks nuking cities (seen) and mass destruction of planets (seen).
Blood isn't so good for the common people methinks, 'cause in the GDC 2005 video the audience didn't respond positivally when the Willosaur killed the Hopper and when the UFO dropped the Spiderthing on the moon who exploded.
Also, pretty much every Maxis game had something cartoony to them (like The Sims, Simplanet and Simant) and they selled good too, people loved the games (myself included) so why should Spore be any different?