A Look at Yahtzee's Spore Review

Earlier this week, I was very fortunate to receive a comment from Jordan where he shared a link for a recent Spore review. This video review is easily one of the most intense reviews of Spore I've ever seen. The author of the review is Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw, a British game journalist and game designer. Before reading my critique of his review, I invite you to go ahead and watch the 5-minute video so that you can get an idea of what the review consists of. This is the link:

Zero Punctuation: Spore


Ok, now that we've all had a good laugh after watching the video, let's get down to business. First of all, I must say this was an entertaining way to review a video game. I found myself laughing out loud at Yahtzee's blunt style and creative presentation. However, I wound up having to watch the video three times in order to pinpoint the constructive comments I wanted to elaborate on. Aside from the humorous side comments, hilarious illustrations, and the incredibly fast British narration, the review itself reiterated all of the main criticisms that have appeared in other Spore reviews I've read.

The first of these is that Will Wright has had an enormous reputation to uphold. After creating games such as SimCity and The Sims, there was an incredible amount of hype attached to Spore years in advance. After Spore was actually released, many gamers and reviews emphasized the belief that this game had not delivered on the hype (very clear in Yahtzee's review). I admit that I was surprised when I found myself completing the first two phases after only a few hours of gameplay. It is also true that the phases are completed in a somewhat linear fashion, so your level of creativity is what determines a more lengthy, enjoyable experience. Despite the fact that Yahtzee vehemently argues that Spore does not live up to its expectations, he does say that both the possibility for endless creature/object creations and the size of the game are impressive. I agree that Spore didn't let anybody down in this respect. The sheer magnitude of the game continues to impress me to this day. Another important comment that Yahtzee makes is when he says that "if all you're after is some kind of 3-D art program for 8-year-olds, Spore is definitely for you. If you're holding out for an actual game, you get to eat shit." This is where my opinion differs a bit from Yahtzee's. As someone who enjoyed The Sims and strategy games such as Civilization, Zeus, and Age of Empires, I think that Spore is a very well-rounded game. You have the ability to play a very detailed simulation game in the early phases and then start building tribes and civilizations in the later phases. Perhaps having more of an interest in these types of games contributes to a more enjoyable experience. I'm only in the third phase of the game, so I have yet to see if the upcoming phases will hold my attention. In the face of these negative reviews, my key to enjoying the game is to keep them as far away from my thoughts as possible. I want to play Spore for what it is and then determine afterward how similar/different my experience was from the reviews.

Yahtzee did introduce a couple of ideas that I felt were very insightful:
1) Describing the Space phase as a satirical portrait of U.S. foreign policy.
2) The statement that Spore will never have the appeal of The Sims due to the fact that the human element has been removed. Yahtzee states that it is not just controlling life that we enjoy, but rather controlling lives that resemble our own. I paused at this point in the video because I realized that this statement was completely true; this was why The Sims appealed to me so much. I thought that this comment was the most constructive and provocative of the entire review.

Overall, I think that the Yahtzee review has points that I agree with, disagree with, and still have yet to find out about. As a game review, it was a combination of a constructive review and a comical rant. However, I loved watching it. It would be interesting to see reviews he's done of other games and see how they differ from this one.