Talk:Spore (2008 video game)

Internet access

Will this be simalar to a MMORPG or will internet access be needed only be needed for downloads etc. I've only got about 30Kbps internet access and have never been able to play any games online. Will I be able to play this? also, please leave the answer on my talk page - Wardhog 17:43, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Citations way out of whack

Looking at the references section - definitely need to clean it up and make all the references uniform. JAF1970 19:04, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, the citation #42 that used to point to Sean O'Neil's personal website now points to a standard godaddy 'for sale' page.

66.36.151.175 21:46, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Citation #29 link is broken and as far as I know, there is no offical creature called Screeble Simsarmy 14:10, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Actually, it is an official creature. The link is broken because SporeWiki changed the site format. JAF1970 05:36, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Fixed the links to SporeWiki's Screeble and Willosaur pages. Anyway, by "out of whack", I meant they weren't in uniform format. I'll see if I can make them more uniform. JAF1970 05:41, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Fixed all the broken SporeWiki links. But the references need to be made uniform. JAF1970 05:48, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

A technical point, but is SporeWiki is considered a "reliable publisher" as per WP:V? In order to be reliable it should have a reputation for fact-checking and editorial oversight, and for most fan-sites, blogs and wikis that's not the case because anybody can publish anything they want with little oversight. If I'm right about that, the references to SporeWiki should be replaced with better references, most likely the references SporeWiki itself is using for its information. Dugwiki 17:49, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

"is SporeWiki is considered a "reliable publisher" as per WP:V" I believe so. So there's no problems there. They're less active right now because, let's face it, there's not much new information about Spore right now. JAF1970 18:30, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

EVO: Search for Eden

E.V.O.: Search for Eden is a fantasy game in which you start out as a primitive life form and then evolve into a human so that you can enter the Garden of Eden. I think it should be mentioned in the article for its similarity to Spore. --Safe-Keeper 23:59, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Here is a video from the game. It looks very, very, very similar. --Safe-Keeper 00:05, 4 July 2007 (UTC)

EVO had more in common with Street Fighter than Spore. Any similarity is far too tenuous to warrant comparison. --Monotonehell 03:46, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

EVO was all about creature evolution. It's not like there's any of that in Spore! MDWilder 20:34, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:SPORE.EA.jpg

Image:SPORE.EA.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot 04:37, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Done! Mrmoocow 06:08, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

External links

Can we review the current list of links? I think it's possible that some of them are in violation of WP:EL but I don't want to remove them without consensus and start an edit war. --Monotonehell 22:32, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

The current set of external links is as follows:

• Official Spore website

Official website stays, per policy. That one's obvious.

• Spore presentation at South by Southwest 2007 - a collection of screenshots, videos, and articles from the South by Southwest conference.
• Spore presentation at TED
• Spore presentation at The New Yorker's "2012: Stories from the Near Future" series of symposiums

These three are presentations: perhaps requiring discussion? I'm not sure.

• Gaming Steve Spore Forums - A popular Spore forum.

GamingSteve has been an undisputed link since the beginnings of the article, and though for some reason WP:EL doesn't actually mention criteria for fansites it is notable within the community, contains content unavailable elsewhere, is used to reference content in this article and generally fits the criteria for a useful external link - amongst other reasons.

• Sporewiki - A wiki dedicated to all topics related to Spore.

Wikipedia often links to other wikis, Sporewiki is the primary one (and is also on wikia). Should probably be linked to because it's stable (per the guidelines) and contains useful content not available here or elsewhere.

• Hooked on Spore - An active Spore fansite.

Newly added, no consensus to my mind. Doesn't appear to contribute anything.

See also Talk:Spore_(video_game)/External_Link_Discussions_and_Disputes for more details of the history of this article's external links. For now, I'm going to remove the Hooked On Spore link until we can achieve consensus. --87.114.0.92 12:28, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Very good. :) --Monotonehell 13:32, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Good Article Nomination

I've nominated this article for GA status, as I think it meets all the specified criteria. References have been fixed since the last nomination, as well as the other improvements suggested. --87.114.0.92 13:11, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Hi, this is an impressive article, and it improved a lot since the last nom; however, there are no references for the cellular, creature, civilisation and space phases nor in the Editor and rewers sections, a fact tag under flying, a lot of unnecessary (well inconsistant) boldening, and a very long bullet point list.

I didn't really take agood look at the article; please adress these points GA review can happen.--SidiLemine 14:28, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and the ref N°9 doesn't prove anything: It only says the show exists, not that it discussed anything repeatedly.--SidiLemine 15:09, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Good article nomination on hold

This article's Good Article promotion has been put on hold. During review, some issues were discovered that can be resolved without a major re-write. This is how the article, as of July 21, 2007, compares against the six good article criteria:

1. Well written?: in depth without being too meticulous, pass.

2. Factually accurate?: most statements are sourced, however the references should all be in proper format, especially web links: see {{Template:Cite web}} for full docs; if you want to see what properly formatted refs look like, take a gander at Iridion 3D.

3. Broad in coverage?: pass.

4. Neutral point of view?: pass.

5. Article stability? this is the crux here. It's an unreleased video game, so how can it be stable since the content could very well change with one announcement from the developer? I suppose if all the other issues were addressed, I could give it GA class, however it would require a review once the video game came out.

6. Images?: all need additional fair use rationale. See the pictures in Halo 2 for an example.

Please address these matters soon and then leave a note here showing how they have been resolved. After 48 hours the article should be reviewed again. If these issues are not addressed within 7 days, the article may be failed without further notice. Thank you for your work so far. — David Fuchs ^(talk) 15:04, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Dave, I'll try to unify the reference link style this coming week. JAF1970 08:18, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

I have made the references all use {{Template:cite web}}. Sdornan 14:24, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I was about to say - you beat me to it. :p Though... not comletely. Still have URLs instead of article titles in a few of them. JAF1970 14:52, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Fixed a bunch more references and added details. The pictures just need fair-use rationale now. I did one here, so use that as a template with Template:Non-free media rationale. Sdornan 17:56, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't mean to interrupt, but I still think that several sections heavily lack references. I'm just saying because I know that most articles that achieve GA with this problem end up ar GA/R, and by then everyone has moved on to something else, or is too discouraged to come back and fix it. --SidiLemine 18:45, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

The game isn't even out yet. By the time it is, the page will be completely different anyway. Sdornan 19:34, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Added rationales for a bunch of pics. JAF1970 22:39, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Condensation

I condensed the Space phrase - and frankly I can't see how the article could be condensed without omitting relevent information at this point. Spore is a big game in terms of scope. From a gameplay and a technical standpoint. JAF1970 20:51, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

TED 2007 stuff

Okay, added a bunch of content based on the 2007 TED conference video. JAF1970 08:17, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

Updating screenshots

Updated some old screenshots with new versions. JAF1970 17:34, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Good job. Where did you get them? Some video? Care to share a link?--Viridis^{talk|contributions} 03:40, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

My pics have their sources listed. JAF1970 21:11, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Burrowing

Burrowing is the main mode of transportation for over half the land animal population. It's absence is enough to be notable. JAF1970 18:50, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand the above comment. If the implication is that it should be mentioned that burrowing might not be something included in the game, that isn't a "notable" fact unless you can show that it's been discussed by some reliable outside published source. There's lots of things that AREN'T in the game, after all, and there's nothing in the game that implies it's supposed to be a realistic real world evolution or biological simulation. So I would recommend not bothering include a mention of a lack of burrowing in the article. Dugwiki 18:42, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Train Simulator - it was noted there were no passengers visible. Same diff. JAF1970 21:12, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

I can't find the "train simulator" quote you're talking about. Even if I could, though, I still don't see how a train simultation article making a mention of no visible passengers has anything to do with this article. Dugwiki 23:41, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

That comment is basically saying if we included all the things that aren't in there then every article would be billions of pages long... It's like saying in a song article, "This song doesn't use a B note at all" or in someone's biography saying, "It's interesting to note that this person's name doesn't have the letters a,b,e,l and m in it" Basically, having information that is NOT included is superficial and pointless. --Samtheboy ^(t/c) 08:08, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Um, no. That's not a parallel. It's more like having a horse racing game with no betting, for example. JAF1970 01:46, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

This whole discussion is neither here nor there. This is not a general discussion forum for the game. Unless lots of people have come forward and expressed their dismay that burrowing is a non-show so far, it doesn't merit mentioning (forget notability, gimme sources). There are so many aspects of life, society and civilization that Spore will not (and cannot) include that it's not even funny, and the game isn't even finished yet. As far as I'm aware, nobody's ever said the final version will not have burrowing. 82.95.254.249 20:00, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

It still needs to be discussed whether it should be included or not. It's now been discussed. JAF1970 20:49, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Could you explain your "over half" figure? Aren't the majority of burrowing animals insects? Or other invertebrates? It's popular understanding that trains carry passengers, but as a non-biologist, if I exclude invertebrates I can think of far more flying/crawling animals than I can ones that use burrowing as their "main mode of transportation". Perhaps that points to a more significant omission, as I think all of the land-based animals we've seen in the game have been vertebrate. 69.95.50.15 14:17, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

It would probably be difficult to tell the difference in this game between vertebrate and invertebrate since the creatures are actually just basically animated models. It seems to me that simply by changing the skin texture on a creature from "fleshy" to "chitin" you end up turning a model that looks like an invertebrate creature with an internal skeleton into a model that looks like an insect with an external skeleton. Also, just a technical point, the game does clearly have some invertebrates because all the creatures in the cellular stage would be in that category. Dugwiki 15:24, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

edit to spore releace date

according to GAMEINFORMER issue 171 (and i quote) 'Electronic Arts' CEO John Riccitiello claims that spore may have been delayed INDEFINITELY'

is this true or did gameinformer just hear wrong????? --Wolfdog1dmn 02:34, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Please read all the other comments on this page about Spore being delayed indefinitely and say whether this is the same information or not. --Samtheboy ^(t/c) 16:01, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

what other comments about spore being delayed i read through before i posted this section and saw none then i read after you posted that and i still see none --Wolfdog1dmn 05:40, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

Have a look at Archive 4 --Samtheboy ^(t/c) 07:41, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

Also, keep in mind that as a print magazine GAMEINFORMER is writing its articles a couple months in advance. Since there are more recent cited quotes in the release section that seem to verify the game is still going to be released, (there's one from July 2007 talking about a multiplatform release, for instance) my guess is that the quote you're talking about is either outdated or incorrect. Dugwiki 20:58, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Also keep in mind it's spelled "release". JAF1970 01:18, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Space phase fixed

Removed the list form of the Space Phase to a more focused, coherent regular paragraph-style section. JAF1970 01:58, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Replacing Gamingsteve link with xSpore

I'm from xSpore and I think it would only make sense to remove the gaming steve "A popular spore forum" now since xSpore is hands down *the* most popular. With around 4,032 members, 83,494 posts (several hundred new posts per day), our size stumps any other spore community including gamingsteve. Also with over 50 content editors, our site now breaks the latest news quicker than any other site. I'm just saying, if you're going to list a site because it has "popular spore forums", you might as well list the one with the *most* popular forum. I won't replace it out of no where, I want to see what you other people have to say about it.

Makes sense, I agree... If there is going to be a forum connected to the Spore page, then it should be the most popular Simsarmy 16:03, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree too. But who I am to change this giant? --213.190.195.101 16:06, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

I have added xSpore, if anyone has a problem with that, then contact me. Simsarmy 16:09, 10 August 2007 (UTC)