Spore Bot Parts Developer Maxis Release date(s) January, 2010



Spore Bot Parts Pack is a promotional expansion pack for Spore and Creature Creator game released since 2010 consisting of over 14 new mech-style robotic parts for Creature Creator and provides as a part of Patch 1.06 until it was discontinued on December 31, 2010. It was first announced on January 4th, 2010 on the official Spore website.

This special give away was only available with a code that was available on specially marked on Dr. Pepper bottles (under the cap), or at participating Taco Bell or Arby's restaurants with any order of a large drink. Once the code was found it must have been entered on the Dr. Pepper website[1]. The offer is only open to residents of the USA (excluding Maine).

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History Edit

On June 8, 2005, three years before Spore release, Barrakuda mentioned that Will Wright would like to have robotic parts in the Creature Creator after advancing to the Space Stage, possibly as a result of research in the game. According to Will Wright, he stated: "On the other hand I do want robots. The current plan is to unlock robotic creature parts once you reach the UFO stage and then allow the player to create robots in the creature editor which can populate an environment just like creatures.".[2]

Not recently, as part of a partnership with Dr. Pepper and Electronic Arts, players can enter a code from a bottle or cup to get 14 new robot parts for the Creature Creator. The promotion ended on December 31, 2010.

Controversy Edit

Ever since it was announced, the Mech Pack caused a great deal of controversy due to it being exclusive to residents of the USA, and the fact that the offer was limited to Dr. Pepper soft drinks. It has also been recently discovered that the pack contains the long-anticipated Patch 1.06, which only contributed to the controversy.

Soon after the announcement, many creations featured on the Most Popular New creations list demand the parts be made into a patch, available for everyone around the world, PC, and Mac and Steam users.

Due to the fact that users can't get the parts outside of the US, a pirated version has been floating around. The pirated version does not allow you to share the mech creations due to the game not registering as the user actually having a serial for it.

Although each bottle clearly stated that "Every Bottle Wins", it was noted that, although rare, some bottles lacked a code, which added to the controversy. Several users made complaints and creations claiming that they will boycott EA and some people have downrated the bots.

After submitting a code, the Dr. Pepper website will sen to a page on the Spore website where the user will be able to download the parts pack and (if the user doesn't have it) the EA download manager. Occasionally, this screen will not have the download link attached to it, or the page may simply fail to load. Maxis has yet to say anything since the controversy began, so there is no known solution to the problem.

Several weeks following the start of the controversy, a page on the official Spore Forum held two messages:

Update (2/19): The issue with Dr. Pepper parts not showing up in-game should now be resolved. Thanks for bearing with us as we got a fix out.

Update (2/19): We are aware that Dr. Pepper parts are not currently being correctly granted to players who redeem their codes. Thanks for your patience as we work to resolve this.

An (unconfirmed) way to fix this is to download the patch on an alternate computer, then it will be saved to EA download manager. Then, the user can download it without having to go to the website. However, it will only work for the username downloading the patch with, and it will lock if any other users attempt to download it.

Around the beginning of the year, the deadline was extended to end of 2011. It was was r explained why, but this action caused the controversy to grow even more. Unlike last time, the user could still get the parts from the Dr. Pepper website if they had any unused codes, but the codes were no longer being made.

After the Spore client update in March 2017, many users whose redeemed codes did not receive a download link for Bot Parts. They were instead included within the client. Bot Parts remain unavailable for users who did not redeem a Dr. Pepper code.

Trivia Edit