The year is 90,000 B.C. and I don’t want to alarm you but there’s an Ice Age right around the corner. Time is short if you want to survive (or maybe even thrive). This encroaching Ice Age is the backdrop of this game that recreates what the species of the Earth battled for vying for survival and dominance. The game starts with all species in balance but in the typical “Survival of the Fittest” battle those balances tip.

Dominant Species is a game that grabbed my attention after hearing numerous glowing reviews online and my own desire to “step it up a notch” so to speak in how involved the games are that I play. Dominant Species is easily the most involved game in my collection and requires players that are serious about playing a game (you know what I mean). If you’re interested in getting together with friends, having a few drinks, and shooting the shit while playing a board game I think I’d have to recommend looking elsewhere. Playing a game like Dominant Species not only takes hours if played correctly, it’s the kind of game that requires the game itself to be the center of the action and not something that is just the glue to get some people to a table together.

To start the game each player will choose a different species of animal to vie for dominance with. Choices range from mammals, arachnids, amphibians, birds, etc. and have different inherent bonuses, bonuses and starting setup. The board is made up of a hex map that will hold tiles for different kinds of climates/terrain that will build and expand as the game goes on. It goes without saying that different species thrive in different climates so the strategy obviously lies in leveraging the world to serve your chosen species best. Of course this is before the tundra and the ensuing ice age roll in.

The most interesting part of the game for me is the “Planning Phase” where players take turns deciding what actions they’ll take in the next phase. So you’re not taking actions, just declaring which actions you’re going to be taking. Each player has a number of Action Pawns (the number can go up and down over the course of the game) that they’ll use to declare actions. On the game board there’s a huge action display that lists out the different options, and a corresponding number of times that action can happen per round. You can see it in the picture below running down the right side, the big cylinder blocks are the action pawns.

So players take turns taking their available pawns and placing them in the spaces for the action they’d like to take. There are 11 different actions with names like “Adaptation,” “Glaciation” and “Wanderlust.” I’m not going to go into great detail here, but these actions will let you do things like change terrain on the map, adapt your species to a new element, or move around the board.

Once the players have all depleted their available pawns then the game moves into the execution phase, at which time the pawns are removed from the board top to bottom and left to right with the action being taken when the pawn is removed. So it doesn’t matter the order of your turn in placing the pawns, since you’ll take your action in a set order depending on what you pick. So if you put your first pawn on the Domination track (the last one) then you’ll take that action last in the round.

Some sections of the action display like “Regression” and “Wasteland” will affect all species on the board that have particular elements attached to them, which of course can change over time. So you could try to hurt your opponents chances by forcing one of their species traits into regression putting them into a spot where they can’t survive. Of course they’ll be doing the same to you. Some actions let you expand areas of control, some let you adapt to more elements, some offer victory points. You need to strike a careful balance to keep your species relevant and garner some points for yourself.

Winning rounds an being crowned dominant of certain terrains over the course of the game gains you access you “Dominance Cards” that you can use for special abilities or actions. A few are laid face up at the beginning of each round and when a species is declared dominant on each tile that player can take a perform the actions listed on the card.

These rounds continue until the Ice Age card shows up on the board, at which time all the animals out are scored and whichever player has the most victory points is declared the dominant species and wins the game!

I’ll tell you right now this is easily the most complex game we’ve looked at here on Perpetual Geek, so the breakdown above is pretty basic just to give you an idea of how it all plays out. While it’s definitely an involved game, the instruction manual is excellent and most cards and spots on the board are pretty clear once you get the progression of the game down.

The first thing you’ll notice while digging through the game or even just by looking at the pictures here is that the game isn’t much to just look at. There’s not much in the way of engaging artwork or components. It’s really the opposite of something that a company like Days of Wonder would put out. Now that’s not a bad thing at all, especially on account of GMT being primarily a war games company. It’s just two totally different markets that they’re going for.

A company like GMT is catering to the more hardcore gamer marketshare, they really aren’t trying to grab the Zombie Dice or Ticket to Ride crowd here. Which, again, is fine… not every game is meant to appeal to everyone shopping for one. I’d call the design of the game competent and functional, which let’s be honest is the most important part of the “look.”

I will say I enjoyed playing through Dominant Species (even though I got my butt kicked). There’s a ton of stuff going on and lots to pay attention to, though it all makes a lot of sense once you see it in action for a few minutes. While the game is complex I don’t think it’s anywhere near as complex as it looks. It really is quite daunting to look at. If I had a complaint about Dominant Species it would just be the typical game time being in the 3 hour territory. Finding people willing to play it might be tough going, so there’s a question of how often you’d really get the chance to get it to the table. But given the right group of friends that wouldn’t be an issue.