Primordial Soup

Players each control a species of primitive, amoeboid organisms that interact in a shared ecosystem by feeding on others’ waste and competing for survival. Play proceeds through rounds of movement, feeding, environmental shifts, gene acquisition and reproduction, with organisms occasionally forced to discard genes or die due to changing conditions. Players spend resources to add genes that modify movement, metabolism, reproduction, attack or defense, then resolve reproduction and mortality before scoring. The game ends when a species reaches the target score or the environmental deck is exhausted; victory goes to the player with the most successful population and evolved traits.

Players: 3–4 best 4
Playing time: 90 min
Age: 12+
Complexity: 2.7 / 5

5.2 on LudoyaGrid MovementDice RollingVariable Player Powers

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About the game

Design: Doris Matthäus
Frank Nestel
Art: Doris Matthäus

Expansions

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Primordial Soup: Freshly Spiced1998

Where to buy it

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Full stats in Ludoya

26
Plays logged: 23
Players: 1h 37m
Average play: 17
In collections: 4
On wishlists

5.2/10

from 7 Ludoya reviews

Tomol8.0
It comes with 6 sets of fimo amoebas and a few cards from freshly spiced
Evan3.5
Fun game where your pieces need to eat cubes of other player's colors to survive, and upon doing so you drop cubes of your color. It's a fun game in concept and the art on the evolution cards is pretty cute. It does suffer from a long time between turns, and since all cards are available for purchase at any time, you do tend towards analysis paralysis with so many different cards to pick from. Additionally, there is a small bit of randomness where you need to have a decent amount of money on hand for when the game randomly decides you can only have 6 points of upgrades instead of the average of 9-12. This determination is chosen by random event card, and you don't know what it will be ahead of time, which makes planning a challenge. All that being said, I do enjoy this game a lot. It's a really fun and creative abstract that only suffers a little from it's age. There are many clever mechanisms here that are ahead of it's time, such as having turn order determined by who has the most points, and then when a player gains points they leapfrog over other player's scoring markers not counting those spaces, thereby acting as a catch-up mechanism. ☆ Art and components ★ Innovative mechanics ★ Handles 5 or more players ★ Good with min or max players ☆ Low time between turns ☆ Comfortable complexity ★ Re-playability ★☆☆ Enjoyment
Javier G8.0
Very good game and very funny. Better with 4 than 3 players