Have you heard of “Spore” — the new game from Will Wright, creator of SimCity and the Sims? The PC game won’t be released for at least another 1 1/2 years but right now I’m pretty sure it is the best video game ever made.

How can I say this? Well, I’ve seen Will Wright walk-through and talk-through what Spore is in both a “one-hour presentation” from the 2005 Games Developer Conference and an edited 35-minute version.

I’m still getting my head around “micro-chunking” as a marketing strategy but I think there is something really big here.

Spending 35 minutes watching Wright talk about his latest obsession is entertainment in itself. Heck, watching this on my Mac beat out watching CSI on TV one night last week. But it is also one of the best ads for a new product I’ve ever seen. Really a 35-minute infomercial full of passion and ideas that made me “ooh” out loud. We need to start thinking much more about making marketing that is inherently compelling AND entertaining AND incredibly easy to pass along. I found this on “Google Video” via “boing boing” and now you watched it on “One Degree” and if you took the time to watch the video my guess is you’ll be talking about this and passing it along to.

Now, does anyone know if “EA” released this video intentionally, or was it a fan that put this online? Either way, this is a glimpse at the future of advertising.

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Originally published at www.onedegree.ca on March 20, 2006.