3pointD.com

It’s not a very good shot, but if you look closely you can see Robin Williams in the lower left of the photo above, giving a demo of Will Wright’s new game, Spore, at E3. Of course, Will had already done the official demo, which was hilarious in itself, but not so funny as to watch Williams demonstrate how easy it is to use the creature creation tool, all the while giving a running commentary on how he was making a creature that could kiss its own ass, etc. A video of the event will be posted to YouTube, according to the Spore team, but it doesn’t seem to be up there yet.

Besides the hilarity, the game itself looks amazingly impressive. I rarely see a demo that makes me really want to get my hands on a game, but this was one. It’s properly 3pointD, as well, and it’s all kinds of game. It begins as more or less an RPG, evolves into an RTS, and ends up as an inter-galactic empire-building exercise, all in full user-created 3D. And of course the nice thing about it is that everyone’s creatures are available for anyone to download to their own universe.

I’ve heard a lot about Spore, but one thing I found intriguing is that the new races you create take on NPC behaviors after you move on to the next generation or creature. So if I’ve been playing my eight-legged Robin Williams monsters as a race of violent conquerors (or vulgar comedians), they’ll continue to be violent conquerors (or vulgar comedians) after you download them to your universe. I like the fact that in Spore, not only do your creations travel from universe to universe, but your personality travels with them.

Vulgar comedian and violent conqueror: