Bios: Megafauna (2ed)

Starting as a phylum of either a plant, mollusk, insect, or vertebral skeletal type, from one to four players make a beachhead on one of the four drifting cratons in the Ordovician. From a founding archetype species, you will sire squawking, flapping, and paddling species, represented by different shaped figures. Shapes are important because, for instance, a flying shape can only be preyed upon by another flying shape. Disperse these creeples across the weedy, forested, swamp, and sea biomes of your craton, or even to raft to new cratons. Each shape is a species, and each species has its own tableau. Mutation cards and organ cubes in this tableau enable the creeples of that shape to win in contests with other herbivores or carnivores.

At the end of each 5-turn era, you will be awarded fossil tokens as Victory Points based on where you rank in terms of living creeple populations. Your struggle for terrestrial dominance may eventually include mutualism, emotions, tools, and language, worth VPs at the game’s end. Although these achievements elevated a certain mammal species to notoriety, in your game things may occur differently.