Evo - a fun family game for 3 to 5 players, ages 12 and up which is easily learnt and has plenty of combinations to keep people coming back for more.

The objective of the game is to have more mutation points than your opponents, these are earnt each round according to the number of Dinos you have surviving on the board as the planets climate changes and spent to buy additional mutant genes.

Components

1 Large Game Board, made from 2 reversible half boards to create 3 different areas of play, this varies according to the number of players

50 Dino Tokens, 10 in each of the 5 player colours (blue, brown, green, pink and yellow)

1 Information Board which shows the sequence of play, the weather and the meteor progress marker

1 Bidding Board which also has the Mutation Track on the outside of the board which keeps a note of players scores

1 Wooden Meteor Marker (grey) which is moved every turn towards it's final impact with the planet

1 Wooden Climate Marker (black).

5 Initiative Markers, one in each of the player colours.

5 Mutation Markers, one in each of the player colours and used to keep track of the score on the outside of the Bidding Board

5 Portrait Cards, used to place your additional Gene Counters on

62 Gene Counters which are used to mutate your Dino and help them survive the climatic rigours, the types of counters are:

• 6 Tail Genes - longer the tail the earlier you go in the round
• 12 Foot Genes - each foot allows you to move one of your Dinos
• 8 Horn Genes - horns give you an advantage in combat
• 8 Egg Genes - each egg allows you to spawn an additional Dino each round
• 8 Fur Genes - helps your Dino survive in a cold zone
• 8 Parasol Genes - helps your Dino survive in a hot zone
• 6 Mutant Genes - reduces the mutation point cost of new genes
• 6 Card Genes - allows a new event card to be drawn

26 Event Cards

1 Cloth Bag, used to hold the Gene Counters during the game and allows a blind draw to be made

1 Die, used to determine climate change each round and to help to decide player order where other factors are equal

1 Rule Book

Setting Up

The setup varies slightly dependent on the number of players, with 3 players use the two small sides of the reversible game boards, for 4 players use one large and one small, for 5 players use both of the large sides. You should see the number of white stars in the sea equivalent to the number of players.

Place the gene counters into the cloth bag.

Deal each player 3 of the event cards face down.

Each player selects a colour, takes their Dino counters and then place their Mutation marker on 10 on the Mutation Track.

Each player now selects a starting point, sits close to it and places one Dino counter on the Beach (yellow space) adjacent to the white star.

Game Play

The game takes part in rounds and continues until the meteor impacts with the planet and destroys the dinosaurs. Each round is split into phases, these are Initiative, Climate, Movement, Births, Survival and Mutation, lastly Meteor and Evolution.

Initiative: the player with the longest tail plays first, if this leaves players equal then the player with fewest Dinos goes before those with more and if still equal then roll the dice and lowest goes first. The initiative pawns are now placed in their sequence on the Information Board.

Climate: the player who is going first this round now rolls the dice to determine the climatic effect. On a roll of 1 the climate marker is moved anti-clockwise, a 2 means the climate stays as it is and 3 through to 6 leads to clockwise rotation. The climate marker determines how hot or cold it is for this round and therefore which zones may be deadly to Dinos. The zones are Beaches (yellow), Plains (green), Hills (brown) and Mountains (grey) and range from hottest to coldest.

Movement and Combat: you can move one or more of your Dino Counters a total number of spaces equivalent to the number of legs your Dino has. This enables you to move between Climate zones to allow more of your Dinos to survive the climatic change. If you want to move a Dino counter to a space where an opponents Dino counter is then combat ensues. The attacker rolls the dice, the number of horns for each combatant is compared to the result and either the attacker or defender survives and the other Dino Counter is removed from the board. The tables describing the result show a slight benefit to the defender.

Births: each player, in initiative order adds baby Dino counters to the board on an empty space, adjacent to an adult Dino counter equivalent to the number of Eggs that Dino has.

Survival and Mutation: each player now determines which of their Dinos survive. A Dino always survives if it is in the current climate zone, so if the climate marker shows Plains (green) then all the Dino's on the Plains survive. One Dino Counter will survive in each hot zone for every Parasol possessed, one Dino Counter survives in each cold zone for every Fur possessed. All other Dinos in those areas not protected and those in very hot or very cold zones die out and their counters are removed from the board. One mutation point is awarded for each Dino Counter that survives this process.

Meteor and Evolution: the starting player now moves the meteor marker along the meteor track, if it ends up on a square marked by a die the starting player rolls a die and if the number is shown on that square then the planet is hit by the meteor, the Dino's all die and the game is finished.

If the meteor has not struck then the Evolution phase occurs. The first player draws one Gene Counter from the cloth bag for each player and these are laid out on the Bidding Board. Starting with the first player and going in sequence players bid for the Gene Counters, a bid can start at zero. If a player is outbid for an item then they get next bid on what they like which might increase the bid for the same counter or bid against another counter. Once the last bid has been made and each Gene Counter has a bid then the bidding closes and the payments are made. Note that Mutant Gene counters reduce the cost of the new Genes, the cost is reduced from the Mutant Track.

The Hooks

There is a real struggle in this game, you never have enough movement, parasols or furs to ensure all your Dinos survive and you can only gain one new mutant gene per go. The random factor of which new Mutant Genes are drawn each round mean that a player has to keep a flexible strategy to stay ahead. However, there are always options for teamwork to help stop someone who appears to be drawing out a lead. The vagaries of climate control keep each player on their toes and force them to consider how they are going to manage survival each time.

Your Tactics

To go First or not ?

Placing Baby Dinos ?

Cards ?

• Pthermodactyl - played during phase 5 allows all of your Dinos to survive in a cold climate irrespective of whether you have enough furs to survive.
• Vegetarian Diet - played at the beginning of phase 3 and prevents all combat this turn.
• Deluge - on a roll of 1 to 4 all Dinos on shoreline spaces die and are removed from the board.
• Unexpected Gene - worth 2 mutation points at the end of the game allowing you to leap frog an opponent.

Conclusion

This is a fun and simple game and allows players the opportunity to see how climate change affects the lives of the Dinos.

Although this game is designated as being age 12+ it is simple enough that supervised children could play this game and gain complete enjoyment from it earlier than this.

Additional Reviews

Details from Boardgamegeek