EA announced last Tuesday that Spore, the Will Wright ubergame that has been mentioned in approximately one in every three articles on PC gaming written since 2005, finally has a release date. So gather the family around the PC and huddle in baited anticipation of September 7th, because this time, it’s happening. Sources close to Will Wright at the time of the announcement confirmed that he was not crossing his fingers, had not declared it opposite day and at no time pointed at a hidden camera and told them they had just been “Punk’d.”

Developing your own game just got easier thanks to the kindly makers of Havok. Their core physics suite, “Havok Complete” (combining their previous Physics and Animation offerings) will be free for non-commercial use starting this May. As a single event, this isn’t the most earth shattering announcement ever. However, when viewed in the context of an ever-increasing amount of freely available game middleware, like Valve’s Steamware, or entire frameworks like the recent Microsoft XNA updates, the playing field is skewing more toward the independent developer every day. So if you’ve been dreaming of making “Babyz, but in space,” now’s the time.

GDC wouldn’t be any kind of proper gaming event without the requisite headline-grabbing Peter Molyneux comments. Highlights: On Fable 2’s AI: Imagine if you could take Black & White and multiply it by a billion. On EA and Bullfrog: I made life difficult for them. On Fable 2’s gold supply: When you’re questing and adventuring and being a hero, no one will pay you gold for being a hero, because that’s not heroic. On PC gaming: It’s a huge tragedy. On panda bears: “Terrifying killing machines that should all be destroyed.” (Okay, don’t quote us on that last one.)

- Scott Parker