Spore lets players create and control their own creatures

Publisher Electronic Arts has announced that the title will now be delayed until 2008.

The ambitious title lets players create and control creatures from their cellular beginnings through to when they conquer space.

Although no official release for Spore has been given by EA, it was expected to be available for Christmas 2007.

The news about Spore came during a quarterly earnings report from EA during which it issued a warning about future profits.

The company said it could no longer depend on profits from Spore in the financial year that ends in March 2008.

This means that Spore is unlikely to be on shop shelves until later in 2008.

The game was first announced in 2005 and since then has generated enormous interest. The creation of Will Wright, the brains behind such iconic games as SimCity and The Sims, the title aimed to give players unprecedented freedom to mould their creations.

As well as letting players guide their creations through sentience to mastery of the stars, it planned to let the different civilisations created by players meet and interact via the net.

EA said the depressed profits for the next financial year were also a result of the investments it had made in online gaming.

During the quarter that ended on 31 March, EA lost $25m (£12.5m) on revenues of $641m (£322m).