'Earth': Pursuing Growth and Seeking Balance

Create your unique island, filled with terrain and plants that will attract wildlife to create bountiful ecosystems.

What Is Earth?

Earth is a tableau-building card game for 1 to 5 players, ages 14 and up, and takes about 45 to 90 minutes to play. It retails for $50 and is available in stores or directly from the publisher. While there is some complexity in the game (and a good amount of reading), I think you could go younger than 14 for kids with some gaming experience, particularly if they enjoy a bit of math. There is a simplified mode that is a little less cutthroat but still fairly robust, and a team variant.

Earth was designed by Maxime Tardif and published by Inside Up Games, with art direction by Conor McGoey.

Earth Components

Here’s what comes in the box:

5 Player boards
Fauna board
Active Player token
First Player token
Scorepad
25 Leaf tokens (5 per player)
10 Island cards
10 Climate cards
32 Ecosystem cards
23 Fauna cards
283 Earth cards
6 Solo Mode cards
105 Soil tokens (in 1, 5, and 10 values)
145 Sprout cubes
88 Trunk pieces
74 Canopy pieces

Not pictured above are a small pile of tiny cardboard sprout tokens in case you run out of cubes (which I never have), and an achievements sheet.

Earth cards — So many cards! Photo: Jonathan H. Liu

As you can see, Earth is primarily about the cards—those three stacks of cards in the lower left corner of the photo are nearly 100 cards each, so you really want to give everything a really good shuffle, particularly when you first open up the game. I’ve seen Earth compared to Wingspan and Terraforming Mars, both of which also have large card decks, but Earth tops them both—at least in their base game forms. In particular, the event cards tend to be clumped because they will go into a separate area when played, so it’s important to spread those out a bit in the deck—it reminds me of what happens with monster cards in Clank! Each card also has a bit of flavor text at the bottom—it’s an impressive amount of text, though I imagine it probably gets overlooked by a lot of players.

With that many cards, there’s a whole lot of artwork involved, and Earth relies on photography. With some of the recent controversy around the use of AI-generated images in Terraforming Mars, I decided to ask Conor McGoey, the head of Inside Up Games, about the images used in Earth. He said all of the images in the game were purchased from stock photography sites, and that he personally selected and cropped all of them himself to remove people and human-made objects from view. He mentioned that some sources now include AI-generated images but he eliminated any that were marked as such, and tried to avoid any images that were in question, so as far as he was able to tell, these should all be actual photos. That said, he admits that this could be even more of a challenge in the future depending on how sites choose to mark their images, as well as the honesty and accuracy of the photographers who submit images. For instance, there are two cards (a snake and a tree) whose images don’t actually match the scientific name given, according to McGoey. (Bonus points if you can figure out which ones they are, I suppose!)

Earth backs of boards — Some of the player boards are double-sided for solo mode or team mode; the fauna board also has a simplified side. Photo: Jonathan H. Liu

Many of the cards are double-sided and are shown face-up in the photo above: island, climate, ecosystem, and fauna cards. That gives you extra options for each of those cards, which are used during setup and are never flipped during the game. A few of the boards are also double-sided: two have a special side used for the solo game, and one has a side used for the 2-vs-2 team game. The fauna board is also double-sided, with a simplified mode on the back.

The boards themselves are fairly large, with room on them for five different cards (or card stacks), an area to keep your supply of soil, and then a pretty robust player aid section at the bottom. Between the board itself and your 4×4 tableau of cards, each player will need a good chunk of table space, so make sure you’ve got enough room before you get too far into the game! The top of each board has the four primary actions in the game; although the actions have names in the rulebook, the names don’t appear on the boards or any of the cards, so we typically just ended up saying “blue” or “red” instead of “watering” or “composting.”

Earth growth stacks on cards — Some cards have growth spaces where you can stack the trunks and canopies. Photo: Jonathan H. Liu

The trunk and canopy pieces are wooden, with nubs and indentations that make them stackable—you stack trunk pieces, and when you hit the maximum height, you top it off with a canopy piece, shaped like the top of a pine tree. Some of the indentations are not quite deep enough for some of the nubs, so if you stack them too tall they will get wobbly and fall over, but generally the heights max out before it becomes too much of a problem. The canopies come in four different colors but that’s just for variety—there isn’t any significance to the colors otherwise. However, it is funny to me that those colors match four of the five player colors, so maybe the purple player will just feel left out.

How to Play Earth

You can download a copy of the rulebook here. Earth is also available to play on Tabletop Simula tor.

The Goal

The goal of the game is to score the most points by filling your island with flora and terrain, and matching the needs of fauna and ecosystems.

Setup

Give each player a player board and the five leaf tokens in their player color. Set the fauna board in the center of the play area and place 4 fauna cards and 2 ecosystem cards on it (drawn randomly, and turned to a random side). Make supply areas of the soil, sprout, trunks, and canopies. Shuffle the Earth deck well. (Since there are so many cards, I usually place a few stacks around the table so everyone can reach a stack.)

Give each player an island card, a climate card, and an ecosystem card—the players choose which side of each card to place face-up on their player boards.

Earth - player starting setup — Player starting setup; the polar bear is the first player marker, and the fox is the active player marker. Photo: Jonathan H. Liu

On the island card, there is a black banner that indicates how many cards the player will draw to form their starting hand, how many of those cards they will need to put into their compost pile, and how much soil they start with in their supply. Choose a starting player and give them the starting player token and the active player token, and the game is ready to begin.

Gameplay

Earth actions at top of player board — The top of the player board has the four actions. Photo: Jonathan H. Liu

Every turn, the active player will choose one of the four actions (shown at the top of their player board). They get the effect shown at the top, and everyone else gets the effect shown at the bottom. Then, everyone may trigger all of their abilities of that color. Finally, the active player marker passes to the next player.

Here are the four actions:

Planting (green): Active player may plant up to 2 cards, and then draw 4 cards and keep 1. Other players may plant 1 card and draw 1 card.
Composting (red): Active player may take 5 soil and compost 2 cards from the deck. Other players may take 2 soil or compost 2 cards from the deck.
Watering (blue): Active player may add 6 sprouts to their flora cards and take 2 soil. Other players may add 2 sprouts or take 2 soil.
Growing (yellow): Active player may draw 4 cards and add 2 growth to their flora cards. Other players may draw 2 cards or add 2 growth.

Earth starting my island — Getting started with my island. Photo: Jonathan H. Liu

Your “island” is a 4×4 grid of cards next to your player board. When you plant your first card, it can go anywhere in the grid, but then subsequent cards must always be placed adjacent to an existing card. (Diagonals count as adjacent.) Once a card has been planted, it cannot be moved to a different location or removed from your island. When paying for a card, you may trade 3 sprouts from your cards for 2 soil. When gaining sprouts or growth, you must have room on your cards to place them—you cannot trade them for soil at that time.

After completing the action (whether you’re active player or not), you may then trigger all of the abilities that match that action color. For your island, abilities must be triggered in order, from left to right and top to bottom. Every ability is optional, so you may choose not to trigger everything. Your island and climate cards may also have abilities—these may be triggered before or after the cards in your tableau. Many actions have a cost—you might have to compost cards from your hand, discard cards from your compost pile, or spend sprouts or soil or growth pieces.

Card Types

Earth - Earth cards — Cards in the Earth deck: flora (top three), events, and terrain cards. Photo: Jonathan H. Liu

The Earth deck has three types of cards: flora, events, and terrain. Each of the cards has a number of features on it: a soil cost for planting at the top left with a point value (the leaf) below it—this is how much soil you must pay to plant the card. At the top right, there are some habitat elements (sunny, wet, rocky, cold) along with the name of card next to an icon showing the card type. Below the photo, there is usually a colored banner (or two) with an ability, and then the flavor text at the bottom.

The majority of the cards in the deck are flora (or fungi, but for the sake of the game they’re all called flora cards), which may have a few additional features: spaces for sprouts (little squares with leaf icons) and growth rings (a circle with two numbers below it). For growth, the number at the left represents how many growth pieces you may have. The number at the right is the score if you reach the maximum growth height (otherwise it is 1 point per piece).

Earth Event cards — Event cards have a one-time effect. Photo: Jonathan H. Liu

Event cards are special: they have no soil cost, and may be played at any time, during anyone’s turn. You simply do what the card says, and then place it in the event cards area of your player board. Some event cards are worth points, but many of them are worth nothing or will even cost you points at the end of the game.

Earth Terrain cards — Terrain cards usually provide scoring bonuses. Photo: Jonathan H. Liu

Terrain cards often have a scoring condition (in brown) and do not gain resources like sprouts and growth. Some may have additional effects (such as the green “add 1 growth” ability seen above). Black banner effects are like the event cards—they only trigger once at the time you plant the card.

Aside from the Earth deck, there are a number of other card types.

Earth Island cards — Your island card gives you your starting resources. Photo: Jonathan H. Liu

I’ve mentioned the island card already—you have one on your board, and it determines your starting resources, and also has some ability or effect. For instance, the center card seen above gives a discount on cards that have the sunny habitat icon on them. Island cards may also be worth points.

Earth Climate cards — Your climate card gives you a color ability. Photo: Jonathan H. Liu

You also have one climate card on your player board—this will give you one or two of the color abilities, which will trigger whenever the matching action is chosen. Climate cards also have a point value.

Earth Ecosystem cards — Ecosystem cards are scoring conditions. Photo: Jonathan H. Liu

There are three ecosystem cards that you’ll want to pay attention to: you have one on your player board, and there are two more on the fauna board. Each one provides a scoring condition. These may include things like the number of a particular card type that you have, the number of cards in your compost pile, or specific arrangements of cards.

Earth Fauna cards — Fauna cards have specific conditions to meet to score them. Photo: Jonathan H. Liu

There are always four fauna cards on the fauna board. Each one has a unique scoring condition. As soon as you meet one of these conditions, you may put one of your leaf tokens next to that animal on the fauna board, which will score you points at the end of the game. Players who complete fauna requirements earlier will earn more points than later players.

Earth fauna board with leaf tokens — Players place leaf tokens when fauna conditions are met; the red player completed their grid first and marked the achievement with their token. Photo: Jonathan H. Liu

Game End

The first player to plant the last card in their 4×4 grid puts their leaf icon on the fauna board next to the completed grid, which is worth 7 points.

Scoring is as follows (tracked with the handy score pad):

Add up the leaf value of all of your cards in your tableau (including your island and climate).
Add up the leaf value of all of the event cards you’ve played.
Score 1 point per card in your compost pile.
Score 1 point per sprout cube in your tableau.
Score for growth: the indicated amount if you completed the growing, or else 1 point per trunk for incomplete plants.
Score points for terrain if you met the conditions.
Score points for 3 ecosystem cards: your own card and the two cards on the fauna board.
Add up points you’ve earned on the fauna board; the person who completed their island first gets 7 points.

The highest total wins, with ties going to the player with the most soil left, then most cards left in hand, then most growth in their tableau, then most sprouts in their tableau, and then most composted cards.

Variant Modes

The game offers a few ways to tweak the difficulty level. For beginner mode, flip the fauna board over and use the back—it has four fauna spaces and no ecosystem spaces. Also, every fauna is worth 10 points if you achieve it, regardless of whether you were first or last to do it.

For advanced players, during setup deal 2 islands, 2 climate, and 2 ecosystems to each player, thus giving everyone 4 options for each card.

Solo mode uses the solo side of the boards; you’ll play against an automated player named Gaia. While the four actions are the same for you as in the base game, they have modified effects for Gaia, who does not build a tableau but instead just collects stacks of cards and has room on her board for sprouts and growth tokens. Your goal is to score more points than Gaia.

Team mode is an option for 4 players—you have two teams of two. Most of the gameplay is the same as before and each person still builds their own island, but teammates have some limited ways of sharing resources (cards, soil, sprouts, growth, compost) with each other. Teammates combine scores at the end of the game.

Earth is a 2023 Game of the Year Finalist!

Why You Should Play Earth

Earth is a game of systems—finding synergies and creating engines of growth. It’s all about the card combos, and with so many cards, there are a lot of possibilities to find. Almost everything is worth points: the cards you play, the sprouts and growth rings you place on your plant cards, even the cards you don’t play can be valuable as compost. But in order to grow, you’re also constantly spending your points: sacrificing sprouts to get more soil, clearing growth to draw more cards, spending from your compost to get sprouts. Finding the right balance of growth and decay is crucial.

The result is a game that will delight people who love spreadsheets. Now, I don’t mean that as a knock against the game; I happen to like them but I know plenty of people whose eyes glaze over at the mere mention of Excel. I just think it’s important to set proper expectations here. As I mentioned earlier, Earth has some similarities to Terraforming Mars and Wingspan, both of which have big card tableaus and some engine-building, and which have also often been compared to spreadsheets. These games, with the sheer number of cards and the various details on the cards, throw a lot of information at you all at once, which can be overwhelming. But there are those of us who thrive on that sort of thing, who enjoy the challenge of taking a vast amount of data and figuring out a way to sort it, process it, and perhaps arrive at an optimized solution. Like I said: spreadsheets.

The game even provides you with percentages (again, reminiscent of Wingspan): for instance, if a terrain card will award points based on cards with a soil cost of 3 or less, it will also tell you that 51% of the cards in the deck fit that description. When you look at the requirements for the fauna and ecosystem cards, they have those percentages available so you have a sense of how difficult they might be or how many points you could score.

Right from the start of the game, you have to start making decisions about what sort of tableau you’re going to build, with the choices of island, climate, and ecosystem. Some island cards are worth more points, and others may have more powerful abilities. You might get a bigger hand of cards but less soil, or you might have a lot of cards to choose from but need to compost several of them. The climate cards are all about the abilities, usually offering a boost in composting, watering, or growing, so that helps you choose a focus. Some abilities only kick in if you choose that action, so you have to consider if you’re okay with just the secondary effects when other people select the other actions.

And, of course, all of this should take into account both the fauna cards and the ecosystem cards, which give you some target goals to aim for. Fauna tend to be the short-term goals, because you want to claim those before other players for the most points. Ecosystems are your long-term goals, and some can be worth as much as 30 points if you max them out. During the game, terrain cards can offer even more scoring conditions to be met, but you need to balance additional scoring conditions with the cards that actually fulfill them.

Earth completed tableau — My completed tableau at the end of the game. Photo: Jonathan H. Liu

I like the way the action selection works, with one player choosing and everyone else following with a lower effect. That in itself isn’t a new concept, but Earth does it pretty well. Three of the actions still give the following players a choice to make: soil or compost, sprouts or soil, cards or growth. On top of that, though, are the banner effects. If you see a player has a whole lot of red banners, then every time you choose “compost” as an action, you may be giving them a bigger benefit than you’re getting for yourself. Is it worth it? When building your own island, do you try to specialize so that one particular action gives you a big payout, or do you try to diversify so that you get a little bit of a bonus no matter which action is chosen?

The game generally moves along pretty quickly—turns will get longer as players have more banners to trigger, but that’s increasing for everyone at a comparable rate, so there’s not too much waiting. The one action that slows things down is planting—the active player can plant two cards (everyone else gets one) so that’s already a little bit longer. What we’re usually waiting on, though, is the “draw 4, keep 1.” Because there’s so much information on each card, four cards can be a lot to process all at once, and then you only get to keep 1 of them. For players who are prone to analysis paralysis, this is where the game can bog down a bit.

I find the give-and-take of the various things to be a nice match to the game’s theme. Some points you gain permanently, like cards that you’ve played or fauna that you’ve scored. But a lot of your points are held in consumable resources: the sprouts, growth, and compost. Depending on your card abilities, you may be constantly gaining and losing these, which feels a lot like natural life cycles, as things grow and die and become nutrients for other things to grow. The trick is figuring out how to make sure that you’re growing your system overall rather than just running in place.

There’s a limited amount of player interaction in the game. They say no person is an island, but in Earth every player actually is an island. You can’t do anything to somebody else’s tableau, or steal sprouts from them, or knock down their trees. Since there’s no public card market, there isn’t even any hate-drafting to take cards that somebody else wants. But that doesn’t mean you don’t have any effects on another player’s score. The most obvious is the fauna, since the score for those is determined by the order that players have achieved them. It’s always a good idea to keep an eye on how close other players are to those conditions, because that can nudge you toward one action over another. There are also some terrain cards that can score points based on any single island—even another player’s. So if I have a card that will count up the number of sunny cards in one island, that may give you pause before planting a bunch of sunny cards. Even though you can’t directly affect anyone else’s island, there are still plenty of reasons to pay attention to what your neighbors are doing and not get tunnel vision about your own tableau.

Earth Achievements sheet — Win, and you may get to sign the achievement sheet! Photo: Jonathan H. Liu

There’s an achievement sheet in the game, and the winner gets to write their name on a line where they qualify. These tend to reward either unusual circumstances or the extremes. For instance, winning with no compost or winning with more than 60 compost; winning with no events or winning with 15 events. There’s an achievement for getting 67 points on the fauna board, which would require being the first to score all four fauna and being the first to complete your tableau. It’s a fun way to record some memorable moments.

Earth is more of a quiet, contemplative game, which suits the theme. Every player is trying to do their best to grow their own island—no need to tear down somebody else’s—and by the end of the game, the table will be filled with a vibrant, colorful display. I recommend it for players looking for something less combative, and particularly if you enjoy the genre of card-combo, engine-building games. (Or if you like spreadsheets!) For those who want a little more direct player conflict, or who aren’t as attracted to the wealth of data, Earth might be not be quite your speed.

For more information, visit the Inside Up Games website!

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