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| Spore Galactic Edition | 
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| From: Electronic Arts
Category: Video Games
List Price: $79.99
Buy New: $63.99
You Save: $16.00 (20%)
New (25) Used (5) from $52.99
Avg. Customer Rating:  217 reviews
Sales Rank: 772
Format: Dvd-rom
Platforms: Mac Os X Intel, Mac Os X, Windows Xp, Windows Vista
ESRB: Everyone 10+
Media: DVD-ROM
Edition: Galactic
Autographed: No
Memorabilia: No
Batteries Included: No
Shipping Weight (lbs): 2.1
Dimensions (in): 0.1 x 0.1 x 0
MPN: 19080
Model: 19080
UPC: 014633190809
EAN: 0014633190809
ASIN: B001AYEGXM
Release Date: September 7, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Features:
| • | Create Your Universe from Microscopic to Macrocosmic - From tide pool amoebas to thriving civilizations to intergalactic starships, everything is in your hands. | | • | Evolve Your Creature through Five Phases - It's survival of the funnest as your choices reverberate through generations and ultimately decide the fate of your civilization. | | • | Explore Other Players' Galaxies - Will your creature rule the universe, or will your beloved planet be blasted to smithereens by a superior alien race? | | • | Share with the World - Everything you make is shared with other players and vice versa, providing tons of cool creatures to meet and new places to visit. |
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| Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.com
Create universal wonder in Spore, an exciting new simulation game that lets you develop your own personal universe. Work your way through five evolutionary phases, including Cell, Creature, Tribe, Civilization and Space, that offer unique challenges, thrills and goals. For example, you can start in Cell and nurture one species from a simple aquatic organism all the way until it becomes a sentient life form. Or you can jump right in and begin building tribes and civilizations on multiple planets. What you do with your universe is totally up to you.The powerful creation tools of Spore are easy to use, allowing you to effortlessly design every aspect of your universe. Creatures, vehicles, building and even starships are all within your grasp. While Spore is a single-player game, your creations and other players' creations are automatically shared between your galaxy and theirs, offering a nearly limitless number of worlds to visit and enjoy. You can also go online to view the incredible things other players have made and can even pull those items into your universe. Spore gives you the chance to make worlds and beings that evolve, grow and delight you every step of the way.   SPORE GALACTIC EDITION - 'Making of Spore' DVD video
- 'How to Build a Better Being' DVD video by National Geographic Channel
- 'The Art of Spore' hardback mini-book
- Fold-out Spore poster
- Premium 100-page Galactic Handbook
SPORE CREATURE CREATORFinally all that hard work creating the perfect being can be put to good use. Import creatures that you created with the Spore Creature Creator and watch them live, breath and thrive in the full version of Spore. TAKE YOUR SPORE ONLINEWhile Spore is a single player game, your creations and other players' creations are automatically shared between your galaxy and theirs, providing a limitless number of worlds to explore and play within. Internet Connection Required. Minimum System RequirementsThis game will not run on PowerPC (G3/G4/G5) based Mac systems (PowerMac) - PC Minimum - Windows XP/Vista
- 6 GB Hard Drive Space
- 2.0 GHz P4 processor or equivalent
- 768 MB RAM
- 128 MB Video Card with support for Pixel Shader 2.0
- Mac Minimum - Mac OS X 10.5.3 Leopard or higher
- 4.7GB Hard Drive Space
- Intel Core Duo Processor
- 1024 MB RAM
- ATI X1600 or NVidia 7300 GT with 128 MB of Video RAM, or Intel Integrated GMA X3100
Product Description
The creators of The Sims present the next big bang - SPORE. Create your unique creature and guide it on an epic journey through a universe of your own creations. Play any way you choose in the five evolutionary phases of Spore: Cell, Creature, Tribe, Civilization, and Space. How you play and what you do with your universe is entirely up to you. Spore gives you a variety of powerful yet easy-to-use creation tools so you can create every aspect of your universe: creatures, vehicles, buildings, and even starships.
'Making of Spore' DVD video 'How to Build a Better Being' DVD video, by National Geographic Channel 'The Art of Spore' hardback mini-book Fold-out Spore poster Premium 100-page Galactic HandbookMinimum System Requirements This game will not run on PowerPC (G3/G4/G5) based Mac systems (PowerMac) PC Minimum - Windows XP/Vista, 6 GB Hard Drive Space, 2.0 GHz P4 processor or equivalent, 768 MB RAM, 128 MB Video Card, with support for Pixel Shader 2.0 Mac Minimum - Mac OS X 10.5.3 Leopard or higher, 4.7GB Hard Drive Space, Intel Core Duo Processor, 1024 MB RAM; ATI X1600 or NVidia 7300 GT with 128 MB of Video RAM, or Intel Integrated GMA X3100
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| Customer Reviews: Read 212 more reviews...
 BITTER IS THE SPORE OF GREED September 7, 2008
299 out of 337 found this review helpful
The game has been just released. But I am not going to buy it. I used to a have a standing pre-order but not anymore, that has been long canceled. I gave EA a chance to mend its ways but it failed. Here is why.
This is a warning Review. Warning of the dangers of the harbored Digital Rights Management (DRM) subroutine that comes unavoidably bundled with the game. This type of DRM (SecuROM 7x with Limited Installations) is well known as it has already been used in at least two other games (BIOSHOCK & MASS EFFECT). So my review is based on first-hand experience of a core aspect of the game.
Apparently EA would rather keep its customers in the dark. That is why, in the past month, EA Forums got censored, Wikipedia entries selectively edited and Amazon reviews repeatedly deleted. What is worse, Amazon (possibly without knowing it) is breaking the law which requires the full disclosure of bundled snoop-ware.
LIMITED INSTALLS? Yes, LIMITED INSTALLS!!! We only get to ride this shiny pony for...3 laps! The official announcement mentions "on 3 different computers" but avoids to clarify what a "different computer" makes: will changing the graphics card trigger the loss of a token? what about attaching a new hard-drive (internal or external) or adding a new user account. All the above have been reported to subtract installation tokens from BIOSHOCK or MASS EFFECT - and EA has intentionally left this area dark gray.
Moreover, in order to enforce the limited installations, exactly like BIOSHOCK, there will be IRREMOVABLE FOLDERS placed in our systems' Root that will effectively revoke our Administrator rights to our own PCs! Short of reformatting, there is no deleting them even if logged in as Administrators.
Is EA trying to pave the way towards a nightmarish future where PC gaming will be a continuously-billed service (such as direct-Pay TV) and not a product?
Is EA trying to trigger a lemmings stampede towards the Pay-per-Play cliff, where gamers will be regarded as herded cows to be milked over months and years?
Is the Company trying to turn our PC systems (that we bought and paid for) into their proprietary consoles, hence monstrosities such as SecuROM that offer zero anti-piracy protection?
According to statements by their own spokespersons (such as John Riccitiello, CEO of EA) the answer to all of the above question is YES. However, I want to make clear that none of these statements had any impact on my rating of this game. The game has enough troubles as it is...
Is it fair to rate badly a game based on its short duration or bad graphics? How about its instability and bugs? How about harboring potentially dangerous subroutines that will render it useless within a 12-16 months? You see how this is going?
In the end, after all is said, with SPORE it boils down to this: who will actually be owning my copy? Are we to pay $50 only to...RENT this from its publisher, be potentially pestered with the insulting need to prove our purchase forever and place our hardware and data in danger?
And what makes this even harder to understand: will such extreme measures actually prevent piracy? Of course NOT! They did not work for similarly DRM-plagued BIOSHOCK or MASS EFFECT, why should they start working now?
So, one has to ask: what is next in store for customers that make the mistake of buying such a product? Will they be required to pay again to buy another copy of the game when the first one expires?
Is THIS the solution that EA executives came up against piracy: since they cannot stop piracy, let's make all our paying customers PAY TWICE to make up for their million dollar bonuses?!
NO THANKS! No game is worth such harassment!
Draconian DRM and a dumbed down experience September 7, 2008
274 out of 325 found this review helpful
The game incorporates a draconian DRM system that requires you to activate over the internet, and limits you to a grand total of 3 activations. If you reach that limit, then you'll have to call EA in order to add one extra activation. That's not as simple as it sounds, since when you reach that point EA will assume that you, the paying customer, are a filthy pirating thief. You will need to provide proof of purchase, reasons why the limit was reached, etc, etc (it has all happened before with another recent EA product, Mass Effect). EA, of course, is not obligated to grant you that extra activation or even provide that service. In a couple of years they might very well even shut down the general activation servers, because "it's not financially feasible" to keep them running. What you will be left with is a nice, colorful $50 coaster. And you will be required to pay for another copy/license if you want to continue playing.
This basically means that you are actually RENTING the game, instead of owning it. The game WILL stop to function in the future. That's inevitable, because even if EA keeps the activation servers going, there IS going to be a time when EA will simply cease to exist because of financial issues or federal laws (like most businesses eventually do).
Second, the game was dumbed down to oblivion. Evolution doesn't even matter anymore. For example, you can add as many legs to a creature as you want, but the multilegged creature won't be any faster than a single legged one with higher leg stats. This gameplay element makes "creating" your creatures entirely pointless (cosmetic only, because everything is based on stats), and brings you about the same amount of excitement as dressing up a plastic doll.
A Major Mac OS X release! But... not if it means DRM September 8, 2008
194 out of 241 found this review helpful
I was really looking forward to this, as one of the few major games to have parallel release for the Mac.
Unfortunately, DRM has a tendency to break subsequent versions of the system services (sometimes on minor releases, often on major releases) on the Mac. Since I like to play games like this for years, there's no way I'm going to buy into something that is likely to screw around with my OS.
Sorry, I'll be happy to buy and review this game and not the DRM once I can get the game and not the DRM.
Not stable on the Mac September 8, 2008
180 out of 224 found this review helpful
Despite the terrible DRM that comes with the game, I really wanted to play it, so I gave in and bought a copy. I had no problems playing until I got to the space stage and saved and exited the game. Now the game is extremely unstable and crashes after only a few minutes play.
Warning Macintosh Users With Kids September 10, 2008
60 out of 68 found this review helpful
*** 12 Sep 08 Update ****
I received a reply to my question from EA. It was boilerplate and mostly PC-centric. It, too, pointed to articles containing busted links (do they ever test?) and was no help.
However, after keeping a watchful eye on the web, it turns out that people have discovered that you MUST have admin rights to run the game. I granted it to the purpose-created SPORE account and the game connects and runs.
Why couldn't EA say that in the doc/install/README/reply? Sheesh.
Admin rights to play a game -- ugh! -- tosses all hopes of parental control and system integrity out the window.
*** Original review ***
My kids and I have been awaiting SPORE for what seems like forever.
We have a spiffy Apple Macintosh iMac with the latest, up-to-date OSX. Each family member has a separate user account on the machine (mostly so I can limit the amounts and time of day the kids can be on the system). As with most software, I installed in with an administrator account. Uh-oh. It seems that only the installing user can *use* the game! No one else can access it. They get unhelpful messages that they cannot connect to the SPORE servers and perhaps there is an internet problem; the original installing user, however, has no such problem. I could not find this documented anywhere in the installation instructions. I dug around the EA SPORE support site -- the one with many links that don't appear to work -- and found a warning that only one EA user can use the game, but that you could have multiple people use that account if they each pick a separate planet to form. Ugh.
I've read about the three-install issue, but I thought the prudent thing would be to de-install it, create a SPORE user account for all to share, and reinstall it there. De-install is a semi-manual process on a Mac (the initial README talks about it, I believe, as does a terse posting at the support site). So, I tossed the application folder and stuff from the user directory and then re-installed it under the new SPORE user on the Mac. It doesn't work. Same as before -- you can't connect to the SPORE servers, but no other message.
I now sit with three frustrated kids, waiting for a response from my support mail to EA.
Sigh.
I expected far more.
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