Skyrim, Saints Row? You've got nothing on Creatures!

With blockbusters such as Skyrim being released, and modern legends like Minecraft celebrating its birthday, it is often possible to overlook some real masterpieces. One of these is Creatures, and the sad thing is that many of you will probably have never heard of it!

Creatures is the brainchild of Steve Grand OBE, an ‘independent scientist’ who focuses his research on artificial life. It is this research that lead onto Creatures; one of the first games to simulate artificial life down to its neurological and biological underpinnings.

Creatures; one of the first games to simulate artificial life down to its neurological and biological underpinnings

One of the most appealing things about Creatures is the fact that, whilst incredibly complex and even scientifically accurate (insofar as it was possible to back in 1997 – computing power has come a long way!), it was still incredibly fun, and even emotional! Many a player had to hold back a tear when one of the Norns (one of the species in the game) more dear to them decided that it would quite like to give suicide a try. Indeed, the publisher (Mindscape – remember them?) even printed the tagline “They’ll make you laugh. They’ll make you cry. They’ll make you think.”

Those with a bit more of a scientific inclination can always fire up the Science Kit or (in later versions) the Neuroscience Kit for some (potentially lethal) tinkering – it’s possible to probe brain cells, examine organ status or even inject a cocktail of chemical mixtures. In later versions, the ability to inject specific chemicals was added and, as attempted to follow reality as closely as possible, you could inject some ATP to give your Norn a much-needed kick, or if you’re slightly masochistic, you can even pump your creature’s blood vessels full of cyanide. Followed by sodium thiosulphate, of course – I’m sure you’re not a murderer!

Whilst the series is still available to purchase, the current owners appear to be sitting on an unsung hero of British engineering

Another example of the technical excellence behind the game is the Genetics Kit. When you got bored with natural selection killing off the weaker creatures, you can simply fire up the kit and tinker to your heart’s content to produce the genetic sequence of your dreams. Ageing can be disabled, immunity to poisons added; most of the flexibility of real-life genetics is available at your disposal – meaning that you can go wrong and end up with a stillborn more often than not! And I haven’t even got space to mention CAOS!

It is quite sad that, whilst the series is still available to purchase, the current owners appears to be sitting around on what is an unsung hero of British engineering. So while we wait for Grand’s next A-Life game (Grandroids), I do hope that new people can experience the joy to be had from the fun, yet realistic world of Creatures.