September 7 is a huge day for Electronic Arts, its Maxis development studio and its head, legendary game designer Will Wright. That's when the long awaited life simulation Spore is scheduled to be released for the PC and other platforms. It's a game that many expect to be a huge critical and financial success . . . . and maybe that's the problem.

News.com takes a look at if Spore can ever live up to the massive expectations it has generated since it was first revealed by Wright at GDC in March 2005. While people clearly like using the stand alone Spore Creature Creator editor (perhaps because you can get a reduced version for free) the actual game is still something of a mystery. Few people outside Maxis have played the game from start to finish so it's unknown how the final product will turn out. And then there's the matter of the game's budget. EA has yet to reveal how much the game's development has cost but did say that 92 people are working on the game full time. Can it recoup its costs?

One thing the article fails to mention is that this isn't the first time a game developed by Wright has been hyped only to fail. A few years ago The Sims Online MMO was given tons of coverage beforehand (including a Newsweek cover) but the title failed to achieve a wide audience and was offiicially taken offline just a few days ago.