Electronic Arts seems to be ready to listen to its customers when they have genuine grievances. Soon after the release of Spore, some people pointed out that you could only create one user account per boxed game copy bought, even if the game manual said that multiple accounts were supported.

The manual was in error and now the publisher says that they plan to implement a system that will allow each account registered with the Spore Online Accounts service to feature up to five different on screen names, with the player being able to tag creatures and creations with the name that he wants from the five offered.

MaxisLucy, which is probably the online identity of Lucy Bradshaw, posted on the official game forums saying that “The content that is made and the MySpore Page will be associated with the logged in Screen Name for that account. Each Screen Name will be able to view and create content, Buddy Lists and Sporecasts that will be tied to that Screen Name. The Achievements earned will be credited to the Screen Name that is logged in at the time the Achievement is triggered. In the first iteration of this change, all Screen Names will be playing in the same Galaxy and any content downloaded by any Screen Name will be available in the Everything section”.

It's a good move on Electronic Arts' side as it allows different people to play on the same computer while not being forced to share the same identity. It would be even better if the developers found a way to create accounts that are totally separate, with different galaxies for different people to play around in. It's not clear when the different screen names get implemented in Spore, even if the developers say that will happen “soon”.

Electronic Arts also said that it plans to implement a system which will allow the user to choose on which machines he wants to activate his installation of Spore in order to reduce the strictness of the DRM protections implemented in the game.