Spore brings social media to gaming

The Ted.com clip below showcases a new game called Spore by Will Wright, the game designer behind the Sim City games. Spore is unique in that everything you create, whether it be an animal, building or island, gets uploaded to a central database and shared with other users. Your terrain and all the other creatures on it, are built by other users as you navigate the universe, fight aliens and evolve. Imagine Sim City meets Second Life and that's what Spore is.

Playing the game forces you to take a longer term view of life as your creature lives much longer than a human being does. And with the game changing each time you play because of the social media influence, you're guaranteed an engaging experience each time. Wright calls the game an imagination amplifier. I'd agree with that.