Why can I run every game but Spore locks up my computer?

Well I recently got a new computer, its about 3 weeks old now and I've had pretty much no problems at all. I can run Crysis at high settings very easily, every other game works perfectly as well too. The only game that gives me problems is spore. I can play sometimes for 2 minutes, sometimes for maybe half an hour or so, until it freezes and completely locks up my computer. The sound will start to stutter, and then the display usually becomes pixelated, sometimes it just turns black. There is no way out of this once it happens, I must restart my computer via the power button. There has been maybe twice where I've been able to have it playing for the majority of the game, until I reach space and it did it again. Maybe just a coincidence though, I'm not sure.

For reference, here's a picture of what it usually looks like when it freezes: http://img512.imageshack.us/my.php?image=p1010341mv8.jp...

Specs:
Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 3.16GHZ
Radeon HD 4870
4 GB Ram DDR2
Windows Vista 32 bit running DirectX 10

It's definitely not a heating issue, everything is running at about 50 - 55 degrees Celcius, I've tried installing the patch, it will freeze with or without the patch. I don't understand why it's just this game and none of my other games have this problem.