The Life in the Machine

Being a programmer, one of my dreams has always been to create an original video game, something that nobody in the industry has done before.
After seeing Spore, I became intrigued. Here was an attempt at putting people in control over a universe. After looking at what made videogames popular, I realized the main aspect was control.
People in their daily lives have no control over their environment. They are told what to do, where to go, and how to live. Their jobs consist of standing or sitting somewhere until it's 5 PM and they're allowed to head back home. It's no mystery they're unhappy.
For many people videogames are an escape to a world where they are in control, or live exciting fake lives filled with adventure. The aspect of control is found in strategy games, the adventure in role playing games generally.
I looked at games like the Sims, and noticed what made them so popular is not just the illusion of control, but the degree of control. You have complete control over people's lives.
Before the Sims, there was Sim Earth. A game in which you do not control individual people, but an entire Earth! I came to the conclusion that I had to develop a game similar to Spore, in which the player subtly "guides" evolution. What caused Spore to be such a failure is the lack of realistic control people had. It hardly resembled evolution.
To do this, I began by generating a physics system. I know little of physics but decided to study it, and try to create a simplified version in which certain particles can interact, in specific manners. When it comes down to it, physics is simply complex mathematics.
I simulated energy, and matter, and created a simple system, with a sun emitting energy, circled by a planet catching said energy.