Illinois Genetic Algorithms Laboratory

Will Wright creator of Sim City, the Sims, and other popular simulation-based games previews his new game Spore in a BBC article. The ambitious project simulates the evolution of organisms in a large multi-player controlled ecosystem. I met Will Wright some number of years ago at a Sante Fe Institute workshop organized by John Holland at the University of Michigan, and in that sense, it is not surprising that he has tackled evolution and genetics as the basis for a computer game. It is not clear from the BBC article or a more detailed account at Gamespy whether Spore uses genetic algorithms or not. If so, the idea is similar to Dawkins Blind Watchmaker code of many years ago, but the organisms in Spore are 3D, dynamic, and generated from 22,000 different animations.

Do any readers know of more GA/EC detail on Spore? The project is breathtaking in its ambition and scope. I’m not much of a computer game fan (ask the 2 penguins), but even I might have to own a copy of this one. Hat tip to Step into the future.