Nature ►►► What did we think?

[@graymeeple9620]

Thanks for the great review. I personally don't mind random events. I sometimes like a bit of unpredictability to shake things up. I guess that's the great thing about this hobby. There are so many different mechanisms that there's something out there for everyone!

[@Valcurdra]

I do really like games that allow for easy modular adaption, its great that there isn't just one big deck you shuffle all expansions into, or having to combine individual traits then re seperate them all out at end game. Smart decision. In the past I have had great success with family casual gamers, starting games small and easy and then introducing additional rules slowly. Eventually you can end up playing quite a heavy euro with gamers that would baulk at heavy games normally.

[@basieellington6493]

I bought OCEANS a few years ago... I don't know how I feel about the designers releasing the same game over and over again every year with minor changes, and plus: cutting the support for their earlier versions like OCEANS or EVOLUTION. The new version might be a little bit better but all it does for me right now is making me feel buyer's remorse. And frankly, Some KZbinrs are guilty of this as well by not putting this into the perspective of the buyer and giving yet another next iteration of the same game the same spotlight like a fresh game with new ideas... I think your video lacks the discussion of "is this game for you if you own XYZ?" Otherwise, I always really appreciate your opinion which makes your thought processes very transparent. Thanks for the helpful video!

[@rahdo]

well, bear in midn this game is a pretty big divergence from the previous versions, and its existence doesn't invalidate the earlier ones, which are just as fun as they've ever been :) this is like ticket to ride: europe vs ticket to ride, or pandemic: rising tides vs pandemic. a new twist on an old classic that keeps the core gameplay but evolves it in new directions :)

[@Cheddarific]

The tundra module plus base game sounded a lot like you were playing my copy of Evolution: Climate. Core decisions were identical. Cards and options sounded the same. I also own Evolution: the Beginning to solve the gateway problem. (Then we can play plain Evolution, and finally Evolution: Climate.) I’d love to get some of those modules onto my table, and would have paid $20 to add some cards, but probably won’t pay so much to repurchase an *experience* and system I already own.

[@Valcurdra]

I'm not bitter about them re releasing evolution, I am a bit annoyed that "A New World" came along in between versions. But I'm not forced to buy anything new, it's just another option. I think oceans and Another World still stand alone quite nicely as alternative games. I'll probably sell off the other base evolution versions.

[@kaedegrv]

@@Valcurdra But A new world is not their game. It's based on the original. So basically the game is now splitted in two branches, the eastern Europe one and the USA one.

[@surayahdevisser4148]

Hmmm I’m on the fence. I backed Evolution Another World and really like that one because you cannot die there either. But I try not to have games that are basically the same game in a different coat.. it’s cool though that they have so many ideas for expansions… what to do, what to do..

[@Valcurdra]

Yeah I'm going to try both and sell one

[@masterbridgemaster1]

I am surprised you even covered this! :)

[@TonyBosca]

it’s an ad. ;)

[@rahdo]

i've covered every integration for almost a decade now. it would be weird if i didn't cover it :)

[@rahdo]

@TonyBosca on average i say "no" to upwards of 20 games every month that folks request sponsored videos for. i only cover games that i think are worth my wife's time to play.

[@kaedegrv]

Personally, I think this is a step back to the evolution franchise. While trying to make the game more balanced or more accessible it simply became less satisfying. The older games had different systems like better card management since you had to decide what cards would be used for food and what cards would be used to evolve. The game was not modular. The idea of it being modular is kinda weird. I understand it tries to be a way to "balance" and incrase replayability, but many playstyles that were included in the base game before are now part of the modules. I can't avoid feeling as if they are just trying to split the game in different parts to generate a cash-grab. Species now appear each round. Before you could spend a card to create a new species. Now you cannot do that, instead, new species are simply created each round. This means less player agency. All in all, there are less options in the game. I understand why the game was not for you, but the fun part is that the game is trying to appeal more to players of your style, and still did not feel good to play. I guess they simply wanted to broaden the target audience and imo, they just made a good game worse. There are some things which I don't dislike, like carnivore card being readily available for whenever you want to pick it up - which also means everybody else will see you picking it up. But overall, it's a step backwards to a great franchise.

[@rahdo]

the choice to use cards for food still exists, and if you donh't like the modularity, then just throw everything in. the main change as you say is the auto-new-species thing, and to my way of thinking it makes the game much more strategic as you've got more you can plan around for you and your opponents.

[@kaedegrv]

@@rahdo Hey Rahdo! Thanks for answering. I'm afraid we will have to agree to disagree here, haha. 🤣 I've been a Evolution player for many years now and expected Nature and been part of their discord server for more than 2 years. I was pretty... would say, disappointed with nature when I playtested it. I think disappointment is not what I would say, but a bit underwhelmed. Main changes are: 1. Now your species size = amount of food you eat each time you feed. Not a bad change, since now body size has another purpose besides protecting from predators or interacting with other traits. I wouldn't say it creates more strategy though, since this means that forager card that allowed you to it more is far less useful (it laso changed from forager to social, but that's just the name of the card) and many other cards will disappear because they would probably be overpowered with this change. It is for me a neutral change, but a thematic one, so I can live with it. 2. You can indeed throw cards for food. But this is not how it worked before. In Evolution, cards had a positive or negative value. Every round, each player played one card face down. They all got revealed at the same time and the amount of food added to the pool this round was the total sum of the card numbers. This meant player agency, you had to anticipate what players would do. Maybe as a scavenger you wanted to create a foodless environment to force the apparition of carnivores and take advantage of that, or as a super herbvore you wanted plenty of food. Knowing what your strategy was and what others might pursue was key. It also forced you to adapt, which is part of what evolution is. Now in Nature you just get a flat amount of food added each round and you know it ahead of time. Moreover, you can burn cards in your hand to create more food in the pool. It is far more forgiving but also requires far less thought ahead of time. I don't think this makes the game more strategic, tbh, but I can see it more appealing for those who want to feel more control of the situation. But then again, I think an evolution themed game should force you to adapt and this way of playing allowed for adaptation while not making things random, since the amount of food was still part of a strategy and player agency. 3. Each round you get an adittional species in Nature. Before you could burn a card to create a species. This means Nature has 1 less use for cards. More forgiving since you force a steady play, but less player agency. You could choose between swarming with smaller species before or having few but powerful ones. Now you have to keep a steady pace. Not super against it, but I usually like having more agency if possible instead of being railroaded by games. 4. Every time one species goes extinct, you get everything back. This means that any evolution trait they were using is back to your hand, their population and size are back and added to the newly created species in the next round. This is, in my opinion, the worst change of all. I respectfully disagree with your logic in the video about this feeling thematic, since the thematic thing would be "if something survives, you use cards to make it counter the predator". But if it goes extinct, it is extinct. It just does not make sense that extinct dodos now create a new unrelated species of crocodiles with big size and numbers. This completely throws the theme out of the window in order to create a more forgiving game. I honestly hate this change because it makes everything trivial imo. Becoming extinct is far less important because you are going to receive everything back anyway, so you can basically recreate the same species over and over and it gets even better because size and remaining population carry over. I just dnt like it. Even if you simply don't go extinct but lose population, that population gets added to the newly created species. 5. Predatory is now a free card that you can pick whenever you want and it is played face up every time. I like this one. Becoming Predatory is a game changer, so making it less random allows you to prepare creatures to be predators from the start, which is nice. It's also good that it's played face up, because you avoid cheese and gimmicks that were kinda stupid like substitution of a predatory card with another predatory card simulating that you were stopping to be predatory just to reveal that the new trait was a new copy of predatory. This kind of gotcha was a bit weird in the game. 6. You now get 5 cards per turn. The amount of cards you got before depended on the amount of species you had in play. Again, less player agency, more static elements. Don't dislike this one and it's a must given the fact that you can't create new species anymore. Now, that would be all the main differences in the base game, besides the lowered amount of traits and such. Some of the preexisting traits are now part of modules, but you can only play 2 modules each time, so you have to decide in advance what kind of game you want. So in the end, I don't super dislike Nature. I just feel it's a downgrade with less player agency and less strategy, where actions have less consequences and it's a more forgiving game. I've just been playing the test again while writting this, and had to play against a super apex predator that everytime I managed to extinct came back even stronger next round. I just don't enjoy this and I think it was far more thematic before, even though I see how this "balance" can appeal to other types of gamers.

[@mariuszkania9947]

Several thoughts on the game: 1. I like Evolution series but russian version is a hard pass for me. 2. Is there thematic explanation why only three traits can be assigned to one species? Removal of a trait is unfortunatelly not thematic feature as dog cannot forget how to run. 3. Slight dissapointment for me is that there are only five traits in a module. I think that they could easily double thematic traits in one module. Maybe I just expect to much. 4. I can imagine Nature could be cooperative game. There can be third or even fourth automa species introduced as a defenders of a pond/food. Maybe you Rahdo can suggest this or something similar to designers. 5. I wonder if they introduce micro species like bacteria. 6. Will solo mode be included into base game or as a module? 7. I love love love designers commitment to develop the game in next few years. 8. Thank you for timestamps. Yey :)

[@rahdo]

re: #2, species lose traits to become new species all the time. humans no longer have tails. penguins no longer fly. whales no longer walk on land.

[@sleepyazn15]

I swear if they don't come through with support for this game instead of reskinning it with another x.0 version, then I'm done after this...

[@rahdo]

if you're worried about it, then just hold off and wait a few years and see what happens, and in the meantime you've got evolution and oceans :)

[@dragonzilla4236]

Well they did say they have the next ten years planned for it, releasing 1-2 modules every year. 2026 will already have Climate and Diseases I think. (Also I believe I read somewhere this is the last game in the Evolution series, but well doesn't mean there won't be more Oceans expansions)

[@Valcurdra]

Yeah that would be very very annoying, I hope the continue with this version

[@nEvErLoOz]

9 traits only in the base deck? sounds a bit low

[@rahdo]

that's the introductory/tutorial mode. you should be adding a couple of modules, so you'll be playing with 19 traits on an average game.

[@nEvErLoOz]

@@rahdo yes i understand that but still, when you choose to draw in the base deck, chances of getting doubles or triples are really high. Anyway, as a fan of evolution I’m going to follow this campaign closely and probably back it :)

[@Valcurdra]

​@@nEvErLoOzThat's good, as you get better at the game and familiar with the decks, you can farm for specific traits more easily. If you get doubles you just discard them for more growth.