Features & Specifications
Spore Origins will run on the iPhone and iPod touch. EA says the game will be available on other mobile devices as well. Like all iPhone games, the controls use the motion-sensing accelerometer inside the iPhone. The game features a cut down version of the creature creator from the full Spore game for PC that allows for customization of the players character.

The iPhone and iPod touch version of the game has Evolution and Survival modes. The game has 30 different levels with all sorts of bizarre creatures. Users navigate different environments while eating smaller creatures and avoiding the larger ones.

Gameplay
The game starts as an asteroid breaks up, and chunks of rock hit the water, leading to be beginnings of life in the water. The first levels have you as an amoeba-like creature that swims around looking for smaller creatures to eat and grow. As you eat the smaller creatures, a health meter consisting of five hearts fills up.

Once the heart meter is full, the level is over and you move to the next stage of the game. Throughout the different levels are larger creatures that will try to attack or eat you. If bit or hit by larger creatures, you lose life capacity from your meter. Once you run out of capacity in the heart bar, your game is over. You can restart a level and try again as many times as you want.

At the beginning of the game, the only customization you can make to your creature is the color of the skin. One interesting options is that you can take pictures from your album or take a picture with the iPhone camera and use it as the skin of your creature.

After a few levels of the game, you gain evolution points that you can spend on new features for your creature. At first offensive features like a probe you can poke other animals with are all you can add. As the game progresses, you unlock new items for your creature like defensive weapons, perception items and more offensive weapons.

You can also change the shape of your creature with the creature creator by pinching, pulling, and otherwise manipulating the touch screen of the iPhone. The game has a good sound track to accompany the on screen action as well.

Spore Origins is a very fun game to play. The only real issue I have noticed so far with the game is that there seems to be a bug that has to do with the screen brightness. Right before the iPhone puts itself into sleep mode, the screen dims considerably.

For some reason the iPhone doesn’t recognize that Spore Origins is being played and will start to dim the screen. If you don't touch the screen, the phone will go into sleep mode even though you are playing. Thankfully, putting the phone into sleep mode automatically pauses the game so you don’t lose your play. When a call is received, the game automatically pauses as well.

The controls are easy to use and accurate. EA has a feature in the options of the game that allow you to set the tilt angle for precise control however you refer to hold the device. The controls are responsive and you control the direction of your creature by simply tilting the iPhone. The faster you want your creature to swim, the more you tilt the device. The controls are so easy, even my three-year-old daughter could play Spore Origins (I have to fight her for playtime).