As of today, gamers can finally get their first taste of (what will hopefully be) Will Wright's masterpiece, Spore.

The free trial version of the Spore Creature Creator is available to download now. To mark the occasion, EA has dished up the video below showing it off.

The trial version gives players the ability to put together bizarre little alien dudes using 25% of the body parts that will be available in the full version. According to EA, the full version will "soon be available in the UK as a pre-order incentive from EA Store and select retailers".

SPOnG just downloaded it, an action that resulted in giggles of glee not unlike those of a mad scientist from the Evil Editor. He does, however, seem a little nonplussed by the fact that we made our creature breed without providing it with any genitalia... You can see our quickly put together creation (named SPOnGberger) to the right.

Creatures can be shared via Sporepedia. Clicking through to it from the main Spore website didn't seem to be working at the time of press, but you can get at it here. You can also upload footage of your creatures to YouTube with a couple of clicks.

“Today is the day we begin to see Spore come to life”, said executive producer and general manager of Maxis, Lucy Bradshaw. “We’re excited to see what players will do with the powerful and intuitive creativity tools we’ve put into the Spore Creature Creator. Our team will be excitedly keeping an eye on the Sporepedia to check out creations made by players from around the world.”

Check out the video below then (if you're not at work) get yourself the trial version of the Creature Creator here. To find out more about the game, hit our dedicated page.