Sporeler Warning Ep3: Lair of the Turd Muppet

By Shamus Posted Friday Aug 21, 2015

Filed under: Spoiler Warning 69 comments


Link (YouTube)

I don’t know. Don’t ask me. I’m not responsible.

 


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69 thoughts on “Sporeler Warning Ep3: Lair of the Turd Muppet

  1. bloodsquirrel says:

    The only books I’ve read with Drow in them were written by R.A. Salvatore, and frankly they’re the only thing about his writing that’s even kind of good. I have a shelf full of Warhammer 40k novels, I’ve played in boffer larps, and I’m commenting on a video about Chris’ potato-turd-muppet, and it’s reading sentences written by Salvatore that makes stop and say “Holy crap, reading this makes me feel like a fucking dork.”

  2. Warclam says:

    Campsteeeeer, you’re doing it wrong. You recruit members of your own species for your band, so you can make sure they all have the best available parts.

    1. Ilseroth says:

      Or because you murder everyone, and since you murder everyone your own species is the best for murdering anyways.

    2. Entropy says:

      Plus you can never fail to recruit them, because, you know, you have all the same parts.

    3. Kalil says:

      Also, it’s not just for the charming stuff – your boy band will also help you fight.

  3. My Little Turd: Friendship is Crud. Featuring Carebears and, at 17:03, Gungans.

    So the game is nothing like what I thought it might be when I saw mention about it.

  4. TheMartini says:

    Given that you were the first one to utter the words “turd” and “muppet” together, I think it’s entirely your fault.

  5. McNutcase says:

    I’d consider buying Spore after that, but Chris has shown that even my astonishing ability to create hideous monstrosities when given a character creator pales before his mastery of the ugly stick.

    1. Daemian Lucifer says:

      Spore allows you to hone your mastery of hideous designs to quite new previously unimaginable levels.You should definitely give it a go.

      1. Orillion says:

        Except SecuROM, so buying isn’t a good idea no matter what.

        1. Daemian Lucifer says:

          Never said that buying is a good idea.Just that trying the game is.

  6. Sabrdance (MatthewH) says:

    I’ve only seen the title.
    I am afraid.
    Back after I watch it…

    1. Sabrdance (MatthewH) says:

      OK. That wasn’t as terrifying as it could have been.

      I now have a mild bile fascination with getting this game. That’s probably unhealthy. Our host’s comment, though, about every time he tried for awesome he just got unintentional hilarity does moderately concern me.

  7. Gebiv says:

    Turdmit the “log”!

    Bwahahaha.

  8. hborrgg says:

    Why do animals keep turning into those gross looking tongue-cocoons?

    Also, full play-though of this game please.

    1. Daemian Lucifer says:

      The next two stages are incredibly boring,with very little fugly things in them.But they should definitely come back to this and do SPAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACEEEEEEEEEEE!

      1. Corpital says:

        Yes! Go to the center of the galaxy! Grind money for hours and hours, then work your way towards the center through incredibly hostile space to finally get a Minecraft-like ending with a ‘quirky’ alien who invites you to buy some crap on Venus.

  9. Tony Kebell says:

    All I can thonk when the Turd-Muppet is walking is:

    “Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy, oh boy!”

  10. Fishminer says:

    I liked the Drizzt series. I didn’t nearly get through all of it, but when a friend lent me his books in middle school it felt like the first fantasy series that was really fantastical. The whole world just felt like it was dripping with magic and adventure instead of the dark dreary worlds that most fantasy novels seem to be set in. Even the mobster-esque Drow city had lots of cool touches like nobles not having stairs because they can levitate.

    1. Rutskarn says:

      I think I got a little hi-n’-mighty there, so let me stop being a Cool Nerd for a second and say I actually really enjoyed those books as a teenager. My re-evaluation comes from a very different and much more curmudgeonly place than they were probably aimed at. They’re also harmless, which I can’t say about *all* the fantasy books I read as a kid.

      Also R.A. Salvatore has made more money than I will ever see in my lifetime.

      1. Daemian Lucifer says:

        so let me stop being a Cool Nerd for a second

        What do you mean stop?When did you start?

      2. Somniorum says:

        I’m curious, can you mention some that weren’t “harmless” and give some examples of why this was the case?

        … you didn’t read Gor, did you?

        1. Daemian Lucifer says:

          Some were written on very thin paper,and paper cuts are no joking matter.

        2. Cybron says:

          “There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs.”

          1. Shamus says:

            (EDIT: To be clear, The following is a rant about a shitty joke that’s always bugged me. I’m not mad at Cybron, who didn’t invent the joke and isn’t even necessarily endorsing the sentiment of the joke in this context.)

            I’ve read this quote before, and I REALLY hate it. I’ve known several objectivists in my life, and that quote doesn’t describe them in any way. It’s just stupid mocking from someone who can’t be bothered to engage on the merits and instead goes for PEOPLE WHO LIEK THIS ARE DUMB!

            The fact that the setup for the joke requires that we look down on fans of high fantasy as backwards nerds (so that expectation can be subverted in the punchline) is just salt in the wound.

            Also, there are more than two books that can change a fourteen year olds life.

            And fourteen isn’t the main audience age of either book.

            And I’ve never read Atlas Shrugged, but this description doesn’t even sound like a fair rendering of the plot of the book.

            Basically this joke is just anti-intellectual snark that’s more likely to start a fight than make someone laugh, and the joke springs from the very sort of simplistic childishness it aspires to mock.

            1. Jakale says:

              Genuine question, has anyone actually read a book that changed their life? I’ve read school assigned books and I’ve got a couple shelves of stuff that I picked up on my own and none of it ever gave something like an epiphany or the “this is how I should live” sort of feeling you see in Portrait of Dorian Gray.
              I dunno if I’ve lacked variety or always had a good enough amount that nothing ever struck me as “whoah, this can be done?!”

              1. Christopher says:

                Absolutely, actually.

                It’s a pair of series, the Belgariad and the Mallorean, and I reread them fairly often, but when I was young I read them and it changed my outlook on life and how I should act towards other because it had words to say about how we treat other people, and what it means to be a good person or a bad person.

                1. IFS says:

                  I love those series! Some of the first fantasy books I read, and a big part of why I enjoy the genre to this day. My parents also named our first dog Kheldar after the character of the same name in the books too.

              2. Syal says:

                I haven’t*, but my uncle always said Jonathan Livingston Seagull made a big difference in his. Also the Power of Habit made some interesting points, helped me explain the problem with my old job, and convinced me to buy Febreze.

                *I don’t think Wayside School counts.

            2. Michael says:

              If you’re curious, the joke appears to originate with John Rogers. Otherwise known as the scriptwriter for Catwoman.

              1. Daemian Lucifer says:

                Im pretty sure the joke existed long before him.It had to be some brit guy who invented it.

              2. Taellosse says:

                That’s not entirely fair. He was also the showrunner for Leverage, which was a great show. And I hear his new one, The Librarians, is pretty good, too, though I haven’t seen it. Sometimes good writers get credited with bad products, and it isn’t even their fault (other times it is, and they just made a turd, admittedly) – from everything I’ve heard, Catwoman was terrible because the studio mucked it up (it languished in development hell for a decade, since it was originally supposed to star Michelle Pfeiffer and be a spin-off of the Burton Batman movies. Rogers was just the last writer handed the script before it finally got green-lit).

                1. Captainbooshi says:

                  I know he also wrote the new Blue Beetle comic when it came out, which was actually very good. I haven’t seen the new Librarians show, but Leverage was one of my favorite shows, so I’ve been meaning to check it out. Basically, his recent work (that I’ve seen) is good enough that I’m willing to believe that it wasn’t his fault that Catwoman and The Core ended up so bad.

                2. Peter Coffin says:

                  Heh. I wouldn’t call The Librarians *good* as such. But it’s an appealing cheeseball with more nuts that usual and a huge pile of ham. Warehouse 13 shoved about three notches up the scale.

            3. Syal says:

              Having read and enjoyed Atlas Shrugged, that’s a pretty fair rendering of the plot of the book. There’s at least one part where the protagonist is flat-out psychic and the premonition isn’t even plot relevent.

              I think there’s an argument for it containing orcs, as well.

            4. Cybron says:

              I apologize, I don’t want to cause any offense. I actually did read both books at about the age of 14 (along with the rest of Rand’s work), and both had a non-trivial impact on my development, so I do use it with tongue firmly in cheek. I don’t feel that the setup implies anything about fantasy readers (as one who reads a lot of it myself), but references a popular misconception about them that I feel anyone who reads such books has probably encountered sometime in their life.

              It was just the first thing that sprung to mine given the context.

            5. Peter Coffin says:

              You really need to read it. Everybody needs to read it. The concepts in it are very seductive, but presented AS RAND INTENDED, one can actually see the levels of impracticality and cruelty involved in actually implementing most of the ideas that get entirely glossed over when talking with Objectivists in general. The idea that the only way to have a functional society is to run away and leave behind everyone who isn’t useful to rich people is abhorrent.

      3. Steve C says:

        Fun fact: R.A. Salvatore wrote an unpublished Drizzt story where Drizzt fell down a hole, broke both his legs and then starved to death. This was at the low point of contract negotiations between him and TSR/WotC where they were going to give the series to another author.

        1. JAB says:

          Fun fact: something similar happens in Bimbos of the Death Sun:

          http://www.amazon.com/Bimbos-Death-Sun-Sharyn-McCrumb/dp/0345483022

          [The name itself is a joke, as the main protagonist is trying to be a hard scifi writer, and had his book renamed by the publisher].

      4. Wolf says:

        All the spoilers for Drizzt book 1 one whatever follow.

        I actually felt the Drizzt Story was fresh and interesting while still in it’s natural habitat.
        Once the origin story ends, his arc is kind of over and I suddenly realized how super boring and one note the character of Drizzt is. The same traits that strengthened the story when it was used to explore Drow society from the angle of a fish out of water, make him super uninteresting to read about once he escapes.
        It probably helps that all the world building surrounding the Drow was new to me when I read it.

        1. Fishminer says:

          It’s worth noting that Salvatore started writing Drizzt with the fourth book. So the first three books (chronologically) aren’t only a better concept, they are also the works of a writer with more notches on his belt. I think a lot of people react that way to the sudden quality shift.

      5. Christopher says:

        Years later I look back on them and I don’t loathe them, but I don’t like them as much as I did. To be fair while I was reading them I went from “This is pretty good!” to “Ehhhh”.

        Drizzt, like batman, is the least interesting character in his own story though.

    2. Taellosse says:

      The Drizzt books are pretty good, in their original context – an exploration of drow as a subversion of the fantasy trope of the ethereal, virtuous elves, and what a society like that would actually be like, when no one had really done that before. And Drizzt himself being everything his people are not is kind of neat, in that it lets you view his society from the perspective of an outsider (even if it makes him kind of boring as a character when he goes to the surface). The fact that the character of Drizzt became so ridiculously popular – and so absurdly over-imitated – in tabletop gaming circles as a result of the novels’ popularity isn’t really Drizzt’s fault.

      They’re also pretty good for their target demographic – 12-17-year-olds who are only just developing their literary tastes. RA Salvatore is the kind of author, particularly his earlier work, who suffers from re-reading later in life once one’s tastes have matured a bit – those sorts of books are never as good a second time around. Your memory always improves them in hindsight.

  11. Daemian Lucifer says:

    An idea:Instead of restricting your ability to change the creature however you want,make it so that the more changes you do,the more time passes between you “laying an egg” and “hatching into a new species”.And the more time passes,the more the world around you changes and the other animals evolve.So if you decide to make a jumper because you saw the trees are the best source of food,you change just the feet and only a few thousand years pass,and its fine.But if in that same situation you decide to add wings,change the mouth,reshape the feet,and add a bunch of other changes,few million years pass,and the world changes into something completely different with nothing you recognize.Heck,maybe an ice age forms,and food becomes scarcer,or bushes with food pop up everywhere that make your wings pointless,or avian predators evolve,or anything really.

  12. Slothfulcobra says:

    I feel like you must be able to make something good looking in the creature creator, it just takes a lot of work.

    Of course, the game systemizes the design of animals in the worst possible way. Real-world animals are designed in ways that take into account how muscular or scrawny they are, blubber placement, fur length, exposure to solar radiation, and things like that, where simplicity is just as valuable as complexity, and that’s not even taking into account the bigger things that matter, like organ placement and protection. Herbivores need huge coiling intestines in order to get any use out of their food, carnivores need to be able to put up with all the unhygienic qualities of raw and spoiled meat.

    Instead, it’s all about a bunch of Lego pieces with numbers, and you want as many pieces with good numbers attached to the weird, meaningless mass with a spinal cord that composes your creature’s body as possible, and most of the pieces for you to use don’t even make sense from a real-world biology perspective.

  13. Ron says:

    The little cutscenes that play with the little abominations dancing to the dramatic music leads to me to believe that the game is trying to evoke the beginning of 2001, and it makes me want to cry.

    1. Lachlan the Mad says:

      And that music… my god it’s inappropriate for what’s happening on the screen. This game deserves cutesy tunes with xylophones and ukeleles, not dramatic homages to Also Spracht Zarathustra.

  14. Just by way of feedback, I definitely wouldn’t mind seeing the galactic stage as an interstitial week in the future. Spore was huge, I’ve never played it, and I wouldn’t mind seeing all the phases.

    No particular need for creature continuity, though, you know… if it’s not a descendant of the turd muppet, you know, I won’t be angry….

    1. Andy_Panthro says:

      Petition to force Chris to play through the entire game, seconded!

      I am curious as to what the rest of the game has to offer, but not curious enough to pay £15 or whatever it is on Steam (and go through what might be hours of boring grind).

  15. bit says:

    Am I the only one who actually kinda liked the creature at the very end?

    I dunno, as much as it fails to be actually charming, or “cool”, one thing I will say about the creature creator is that you can make things that are incredibly ALIEN, and I really like that. Five legs! a limb that splits into two two limbs, that split into four limbs, that all have eyes on them! Eight mouths, rising up from eight different appendages that come from another, massive mouth! You can actually do some really fantastical things with it, and I really love that. And I feel like that coolness is only really unlocked when you stop thinking about it in terms of being a realistic “animal.”

    Which is part of why the game really fails, because it gives you this limitless, amazing creator, then asks you to design with it a successful creature for a “realistic” environment. But is also really vague and unsatisfying with its requirements and- ugh. I almost feel like the creator would be put to better use in a simcity-style “ecosystem creator” where you’re not trying to make one creature with the biggest and best numbers, but rather try to fit a bunch of really neat designs together into a system.

    And speaking of which, I was always upset that they didn’t include the plant editor they promised for most of pre-release. Hmmph.

    1. Daemian Lucifer says:

      Which is part of why the game really fails, because it gives you this limitless, amazing creator, then asks you to design with it a successful creature for a “realistic” environment.

      The game does no such thing.The only requirement is to have things that boost stats,and if you have those,you can put them anywhere in any fashion.Because the environment is so uniform and plentiful,you can create literally anything and it will be successful.

      The only limit is ones imagination,and their tolerance for fugly nonsense.

  16. Neko says:

    Question: do all species lay eggs? Are there no live births?

    1. Daemian Lucifer says:

      Correct.Though,to be honest,we arent shown birth in the subsequent stages,so maybe that changes once you gain sapience.

    2. Syal says:

      Not all species lay eggs; some of the later ones lay toast points.

    3. Thomas says:

      I can’t think of anything more horrifying than seeing some of these species in a live birth :p

  17. keldoclock says:

    Why did nobody mention Shores of Hazeron yet?

    It is (was?) an MMO along similar lines that supposedly is still being developed… although there are only 3 players online at the moment.

    It’s got 1995 graphics, lags terribly, but does deliver the depth that Spore never did.

  18. Josh: “The only two gameplay style they could come up with are to charm other creatures or murder them?”

    It’s like… a primitive version of the Paragon/Renegade system. Hey, that means this game is a prequel to Mass Effect!

    1. James says:

      this is obviously the prequal story of the buttuglyians that we never meet because someone wiped them out for being too buttugly

    2. Daemian Lucifer says:

      Well yeah.Didnt you notice how all your decisions are boiled down into red,green and blue options?

    3. Grudgeal says:

      These guys must have created the reapers. It makes so much sense.

  19. Blake says:

    I thoroughly enjoyed Sporeler Warning this week, even without many interesting gameplay mechanics to bring up, Chris’s Creations gave plenty of fodder.

    Hope you come back to this at some point!

  20. Bropocalypse says:

    It is possible to make something aesthetically pleasing in Spore. I’ve done it on occasion. It takes a lot of iteration, though. And not everyone is an artist.

  21. The Seed Bismuth says:

    My vote for more Sporeler Warning and with Campster’s cute little creatures.

  22. There was a webcartoonist whose name I can’t recall that posted a screed to EA when they patched the Spore creature creator so limbs didn’t have clipping issues. Apparently, at one point, you could manipulate the width/shape of certain limb parts such that they’d vanish (in essence, the inside would be outside and the inside had no texture, so it became invisible) and you’d end up with a Spore creature that had hands and feet, but no legs and arms (kind of like Rayman). Apparently, this was an integral part of their enjoyment of the game, saying their creatures had evolved to have extra-dimensional limbs and that taking them away was depriving players of a form of creativity and how did they know creatures wouldn’t evolve like this, anyway?

  23. Vorpal Kitten says:

    1) Chris could have just recruited his teammates instead of getting allies
    2) You can make fairly cool things if you ask me! http://imgur.com/a/nEJSJ#0

    1. Alexander The 1st says:

      Not very realistic though.

  24. Christopher says:

    See, now, what the game shuold do is determine how awful you ruined these species excistence.

    in Campsters case they curse whatever foul god made them and when they hit galactic stage become omnicidial maniacs looking to destroy the universe in revenge for the horror it inflicted when it made them.

  25. There’s an argument to be had that Spore could be retooled and called “Rick and Morty, the Video Game.” I could easily see the creature generator being used to populate another dimension, alien space station, or whatever Rick’s latest invention turns everyone into.

    Sporeler Warning should’ve tried to make Cronenburgs.

  26. Spammy says:

    So, while it’s not simulating the same thing, everything that comes up about how where you put parts never matters and in fact the practicality of your creature’s design never matters makes a ringing endsorsement for Kerbal Space Program, which does make (almost) every part you put on matter with regards to location and purpose and aerodynamic profile. You can stick flat panels coming out of your rocket sideways and then watch drag smack you down. But then you can decide that the only thing you need now to get into space with is MORE BOOSTERS and put twenty solid rocket boosters in one stage and watch as your rocket flies apart. Or you get into space and launch your satellite and then discover that it doesn’t actually have a way to maneuver because you didn’t put any reaction wheels on.

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