Spore, the much anticipated life simulation game by Will Wright is upon us. I, like many, have been looking forward to seeing this game in action since it was first announced 4.5 billion years ago. The story behind Spore's creation is every bit as interesting as the game itself, involving Mr. Wright spending a great deal of time speaking with evolutionary biologists and gathering intelligence to re-imagine the entire history of life as a video game. From the start, Spore has been billed as “Evolution, the Video game”. But is it really? As a science enthusiast, I thought I'd take what I've learned about Spore and what I know about evolution and break down a brief comparison.
In Spore, evolution is a linear affair. Creatures advance from one stage of complexity to the next in a classic march of progress. To paraphrase Morbo, “Evolution does not work that way!”. Evolution does not inevitably lead to ever more complicated forms: some species develop greater complexity, some simplify, and others don't change much at all. There's also nothing linear about evolution. Family lineages split and split again. Linking all of the relationships together results in a tangled bush with ever branching limbs mercilessly pruned by the sheers of extinction which can whack off even the most promising buds. Creatures have adapted to the water then moved onto land only to move back into the water again. Wherever there is a niche for life to exploit, creatures capable of taking advantage of the resources therein do so and over time and natural selection, fit into their new lifestyles; even as their close relatives drift away in radically different directions down the generations.
The ultimate goal in Spore is to evolve creatures into beings capable of advanced thought, civilization, and technology. Actual evolution has no goal other than “whatever works for the moment”. If a big brain gets in the way of big jaw muscles, a predator species will develop whichever feeds its young the best, just ask any lion. Only a twig off the ape family branch lead to brains capable of such advancements, and of all the hominids, only Homo sapiens sapiens were lucky enough to dodge extinction into modern days. If anything, you could say Spore relies a lot less on luck than evolution does.
Ultimately, even though Spore's evolution is more Lamarckian than Modern Synthesis, does it matter? I'll snag a quote from Dr. Neil Shubin, author of Your Inner Fish here, “The differences between Spore and nature do not bother me. I see Spore for what it is: a game. And it is a game in the best sense of the word. It is not identical to nature, but it is a world that evolves, that changes and where the players are part of those processes.” Will Wright set out to create a game that offers a view through a keyhole of the vast, dynamic grandeur of the history of life and if it can kindle even a tiny spark of curiosity and interest in learning how our ancient, extended family evolved, then Spore will succeed as more than simply a very ambition game.
I just hope people stop making penis creatures long enough to appreciate both the science and Mr. Wright's creative efforts.
Rant: As much as I'm looking forward to playing Spore in its full glory, I'll have to settle for just the DS version as my computer is evil and malicious and would not even run the critter creator.
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