The fact that Spore is focused on Intelligent Design is not surprising at all, all games that have the player build something are inherently ID focused.

One of my favorite games is the old "Age of Empires" by EA. In that series of games you take a small ignorant tribe of savages to the hights of the Iron Age as you build an empire. I design the empire by deciding which units to build, where to place buildings and which neighbors to chop. Really no different from Spore and there are a hundred games in the genre.

I also play "World of Warcraft." Here I design my character's looks, choose a race and class and send him on a journey of 70 levels. I decide where he goes, what skills he develops, what he wears and how he interacts with the environment and other players. I'm essentially his god, he my avatar. Again, no different from Spore except in focus. Start as an amoeba or a level 1 club-wielding gimp; end as a space traveler or a mighty warrior facing the world's toughest villians. Same basic idea.

It's the decision making and the wide array of choices that make the game fun. As the author rightly points out allowing things like random mutation takes the deciding away from the players. I got a TV and DVD player for that.

-Doughdee222

"Fire me, boy!"