Senior Staff Writer Chris "Pwyff" Tom got some extensive hands-on time with Darkspore, an action RPG based on the Spore Creature Creator. But is Darkspore more than just looks?

I'll admit, when Spore came out in 2008, while I did spend my fair share of time twiddling around with that creature creator, the multi-genre game play of the game itself was not so engaging. I think the problem was that I, like most gamers, felt that Spore had so much potential with its incredible creature creator, but its ambitious design fell short when it came to building a game around such a revolutionary tool.

Two and a half years later, it seems Maxis has found a more focused direction, and so Spore is back in the concentrated form of Darkspore, a new action RPG that combines the best part of Spore with, well, the best parts of any good action RPG. After our interview with Executive Producer Mike Perry, Maxis also invited us to check out some of Darkspore's extensive campaign and arena-based PvP, so I decided to get in there to see if those Spore tools were being put to good use.

To get right into the middle of things, Darkspore is basically what happens when you combine the easy to pick up game mechanics of Pokemon, and you mash it in with the dungeon-crawling, treasure hunting game mechanics of Diablo. The storyline of Darkspore is relatively straightforward, owing to its wide target audience: as a "Crogenitor," your race went about the galaxy, modifying the DNA of specific creatures to grant them special powers and strength. Over time, your race also developed an experimental type of DNA (E-DNA) that promotes the growth of super-powerful creatures. Of course, this is where it all starts going bad, and the unstable E-DNA mutated your once friendly creatures into rampaging hordes of hostile aliens - the Darkspore. Your character wakes up on a ship, where HELIX, the ship's A.I., has finally managed to stabilize the E-DNA and has now charged you with saving the galaxy, with the help of your powerful creatures.

All players start the game with Blitz, The Stormstriker, for the tutorial, and you can then add two more creatures to your arsenal shortly after. There are six Darkspore types: Cybernetics, Necro, Fire, Bio, Quantum and Plasma. There are three archetypes for creatures: Tempests (ranged / support), Sentinels (tanks) and Ravagers (melee DPS). For the most part, types don't seem to be much of a factor in Darkspore, except that in PvE, all enemy creatures that match your creature's type will always deal bonus damage to you. As of this writing, however, players cannot gain any advantages for bringing specific types. Each type does boast a specific 'style' of play, however, like Necro with its heavy focus on life draining, suppressions and fears. I decided to start my game with a team of Wraith (Necro Sentinel), Sage (Bio Tempest, I believe), and Blitz (Plasma Ravager).

The other immediately appealing aspect of Darkspore is that it allows you to get into the customization almost immediately. Not only can you affect, in some ways, a few of your creatures' bonus abilities (more on that in a moment), but you can also individually customize specific aspects of your base hero template. It's a given that you cannot create your own creatures right from the ground up, but Darkspore is still a game with "spore" in the title, so the character creation and creature editing is top notch. If players also like the look of a piece of equipment that they've moved beyond, they can reduce that item to its appearance only, and then they can toss that onto their creature for some extra customization.

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