Maxis releases 'Spore' API, contest

Love "Spore" but wish you had more creative control than just being able to make your own creatures, spaceships, buildings and other objects? Well, now you can.

Electronic Arts has released a "Spore" API, which for the first time will make it possible for fans of the hit evolution game from legendary game designer Will Wright to create their own applications.

"We're working on some features to help the community create their own 'Spore' applications," EA's Maxis studio--which made "Spore"--wrote on a new site, Sporeapi.com, aimed at developers. "We're collecting these features into a web-based 'Spore' API. Using simple web services, you can access our huge database of creations and creators."

As a way to help inspire people to begin using the API, Maxis has also announced a contest to see what the best creations might be. Maxis said on its site that a few examples of what people might come up with are a "display of your own creations;" a "trophy case of challenge winners;" a "visualization of current most popular new creations;" and a "scenic diorama of Sporecast creations."

We're interested in seeing what kind of application or widget you can develop, utilizing our massive database of creations, Sporecasts, and player information.

Create your app from scratch, or download the source code from one of the sample apps we've posted on the API page. You can use this source as a reference or template. Head over to our forum to discuss ideas!

Winners of the contest could score an Nvidia graphics cars, a copy of both "Spore" and its recent "Galactic Adventures" expansion.

And while those prizes may not be worth all that much, Maxis is likely betting that fans of the game will participate in the contest for the simple pleasure of seeing what they can build with the API and in the hope of being recognized by the "Spore" community for their creativity.