Will Wright Exits Maxis, Starts Stupid Fun Club

Will Wright is leaving EA and setting up a new shop called Stupid Fun Club, EA announced today. Of course, he’s not really leaving the EA family, because this new studio will be equally owned by Will Wright and EA. Naturally, this puts Wright on equal footing with EA, which he does deserve at this point in his career, having created such hits as SimCity, The Sims and Spore.

“The entertainment industry is moving rapidly into an era of revolutionary change,” said Wright. “Stupid Fun Club will explore new possibilities that are emerging from this sublime chaos and create new forms of entertainment on a variety of platforms. In my twelve years at EA, I’ve had the pleasure to work alongside some of the brightest and most talented game developers in the industry and I look forward to working with them again in the near future.”

For its part, EA has the right to develop game concepts that spring from Stupid Fun Club projects. Will Wright is represented by Creative Artists Agency - no doubt by former Xbox front man turned agent Seamus Blackley.. While it is sad to see Wright leave Maxis, the company certainly can run without him; The Sims and Spore are being handled by various teams with little or no input from Wright I’d imagine.

So what will Will Wright do at this new company? I expect a bunch of mad game experiments that can be molded and shaped into fun and exciting games. Perhaps Wright felt stifled having to play a key role at Maxis and focus energy on games he’d already created when what he really wanted to do was make brand new games. Whatever the reason this is exciting news for gamers who can expect some interesting stuff from Wright going forward.

The Rundown: Dec. 18, 2008

December should be declared iPod month with all the games being released just this week. EA releases yet another game today, GarageGames tells us what games on Steam use Torque, we tell you how to make a Spore sculpture or a Champions Online holiday card and detail new releases from Konami and Capcom. All this and more today in The Rundown.

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SimCity Creator Ships

Electronic Arts has shipped SimCity Creator for the Wii and Nintendo DS today. SimCity Creator is billed as an open ended city building game with a twisted sense of humor. Like the classic game its based on SimCity Creator lets you build - and if you want - destroy the city of your dreams using new tools and disasters to work your magic.

Using the Wii remote, players begin by zoning their city, constructing homes, businesses, factories, skyscrapers, freeways, railroads and much more using 13 city styles including Chinese, Japanese, European, Mediterranean, Military State, Indian, Egyptian, Las Vegas, Greek, Sweets, Sci-Fi, Crystal and Jungle themes. Players will even be able to build transportation systems with curved roads and rail line.

Look for the game to start appearing in stores this week, with a full retail rollout expected by Sept. 28.

The Jones Report: Spore & CBS News

What do Scott Jones and Will Wright have in common? Well, they both enjoy video games (from different perspectives one would guess) and they both appear in a video segment about Mr. Wright and his new game Spore.

The segment aired as a web exclusive last week (Sept. 18) on CBSnews.com. CBS News science and technology correspondent Daniel Sieberg talked with Will Wright about his popular “god-like” games including his latest game Spore. Scott jumps in to offer his perspective on why Will Wright’s games are so popular - as an added bonus. You can check out the video after the break.

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It’s My Sims In a Box..

The SimCity Box, a compilation of SimCity games for the PC, is in stores today. But probably the most appealing thing within is a trial version of the Spore Creature Creator. (see I Call Bullshit for one man’s perspective on that little bauble) - of course you could have just downloaded that from the internet…

The package includes SimCity Societies and Destinations expansion pack, SimCity 4 and the Rush Hour expansion pack and The Sims Carnival SnapCity. Societies is a deeper SimCity experience where players not only build cities but shape the what kind of people inhabit them. The expansion adds more than 100 new buildings and other attractions to create cities that are even more interesting.

SimCity 4 brings the classic city building game to modern PCs with even more ways to build a metropolis and more ways to destroy it with new god-like powers and hazards. The expansion gives players control of the city’s transportation system, allowing for traffic that is more refined systems.

Finally, The Sims Carnival SnapCity is a city-building game with puzzle elements geared towards casual players. Players are challenged to position falling, colored blocks in just the right places to build the best possible cities.

Look for this compilation pack in stores beginning today.

SimCity Source Released

The original source code for SimCity is now open-source, released under a GPL (General Public License) — with a few minor changes. The game has been renamed Micropolis (the SimCity brand is owned by EA) and any reference to planes crashing into buildings has been removed (obviously in response to 9-11). Those changes aside, the source remains largely the same as it was written by The Sims and SimCity series creator Will Wright and his studio Maxis. The source code is a testament to a time when programmers had to use some pretty creative techniques to cram complicated ideas onto a very small amount of space. For that, and for a number of other reasons (such as it being one of the coolest games ever), it is worth checking out.