It’s been a decade since March of the Ants first appeared on Kickstarter, eventually spawning two expansions. Now, the game has evolved!
What Is March of the Ants: Evolved Edition?
March of the Ants: Evolved Edition is an updated version of a 4X ant game. It is for 1 to 5 players, ages 13 and up, and takes about 60 to 90 minutes to play. It’s currently seeking funding on Kickstarter, with a pledge level of $49 for a copy of the game, or $65 for the deluxe edition that includes the Predators and Prey expansion and some upgraded components.
In case you are already familiar with the original, I’ll have a section below that highlights some of the differences in this edition.
March of the Ants: Evolved Edition was designed by Ryan Swisher and Tim Eisner and published by Weird City Games, with illustrations by Mr. Cuddington, Aldermoth, and Yela.
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March of the Ants: Evolved Edition Components
Note: My review is based on a prototype copy, so it is subject to change and may not reflect final component quality.
Here’s what comes in the box:
- Great Tunnel tile
- 5 Nest mats
- Round and Score Track mat
- 8 Starting Hex tiles
- 12 Standard Hex tiles
- 5 Beyond the Meadow Hex tiles
- 66 Ant cards
- 6 Reward tiles
- 180 Ants (36 each for 5 players)
- 6 Centipede Meeples
- Centipede Size marker
- Round marker
- 5 Score markers
- 30 Food tokens
- 8 Wormhole tokens
- Active Player marker
- 12 Rest tiles
In case you’re familiar with the old version, just about everything in this one has gotten a makeover: new graphics and illustrations, and slightly fancier wooden components as well. The only things that look about the same as before (at least in the prototype) are the centipede meeples and the round marker. The wooden cubes of the original have now been replaced with ant meeples—definitely makes it look more fun to see a lot of ants on the main map, though it also makes it slightly more confusing when you have ant meeples representing eggs and larvae too.
The graphic design in the original had a bit of a homemade look to it, and this new version has been updated, though there’s something about it that still looks a little unpolished to me—maybe the typeface? I’m not a graphic designer so it’s not something I can pin down, so it’s mostly a matter of taste. Everything is legible, and it’s easy to follow the flow of the different phases with the sections at the top of the nest mats.
The hex tiles are fairly large—like drink coasters—and each one has some paths illustrated, along with some number of spaces where you can place your ants to harvest various things. Each tile has a name, and the Beyond the Meadow tiles also have additional text for effects that happen when they’re placed.
How to Play March of the Ants: Evolved Edition
You can download a draft of the rulebook here. The rules described here are for 3 or 4 players; there are some additional tweaks if you are playing with fewer or more players.
The Goal
The goal of the game is to score the most points by controlling certain hexes, evolving your ants, winning battles, and succeeding at colony goals.
Setup
The Great Tunnel is placed in the center of the playing area, and everyone starts with 2 ants on it. The hexes are shuffled and stacked with 2 starting hexes per player at the top of the stack, and then the remaining standard hexes below that (potentially with a couple of Beyond the Meadow hexes mixed in). The rewards tiles are shuffled and a selection is placed on the Great Tunnel tile based on the number of rounds, revealing the top tile. (Regular game is 4 rounds, long game is 5 rounds.)
Shuffle the Rest tokens and reveal one per player next to the round/score mat. Place the round tracker (the leaf token) on Round 1 and the centipede size marker on 0.
Each player gets a nest mat and places 2 food tokens in the Food Stores area, and 5 ant tokens in the Larvae Chamber. (Ant tokens in your supply are considered eggs, which become larvae when they are moved to the Larvae Chamber, and then finally become ants when they are placed onto the map.) Each player also gets 2 cards dealt from the deck. Place all the scoring tokens at the start of the scoring track.
Choose a random starting player and give them the active player marker. The last player in turn order gains 1 more larva.
Gameplay
Every round, there is a Worker Phase when players will take actions; a Soldier Phase where battles are resolved; a Queen Phase to collect resources and feed ants.; and a Slumber Phase to earn colony points and prepare for the next round.
Worker Phase
The Worker Phase is the bulk of the round: The active players chooses an action; each action allows the other players to do a corresponding reaction. Then the active player token is passed to the next player.
Explore: Pay one food, and then draw and place a new hex adjacent to one of your ants on the map, and then move at least 1 ant into it. Some hexes have features like wormholes (tunnels to other wormholes) or centipedes (big enemies)—if so, place those on the hex. Reaction: Everyone else may move 1 larva into the Great Tunnel or a hex they inhabit.
Forage: Pay one food, and then draw three cards from the deck, and then discard a card from your hand. Reaction: Everyone else may gain 1 larva.
March: Pay one food, and then make up to six moves. Each move lets you move an ant from one hex to a connected hex (either through a path or through a wormhole), or move a larva from your Larvae Chamber to any location you inhabit. Reaction: Everyone else may move one ant one step.
Play Card: Play a card from your hand, paying the ant cost by discarding ants from the board or larvae from your chamber. Events are one-time effects; Evolution cards are placed on the ant body on your player mat; Colony Goals give you objectives that will earn points if you achieve them, and also have a one-time effect. You may only have 2 Colony Goals in play, so you must discard goals if you want to play a third card.
Evolution cards give you special abilities—you stack cards of the same body segment (head, thorax, abdomen) and only the top card is in effect. They also provide segment bonuses: every head you have in the stack adds one to your ferocity for battles; every thorax lets you place a larva into the Great Tunnel at the start of the Worker Phase; every abdomen lets your food tokens feed 1 additional ant. Also, every time you have played one of each segment, you score 3 points for the full body.
Reaction: Everyone else may discard a card to draw a card.
Rest: If you are done taking actions for the round, you take one of the rest tiles and get the rewards shown. Every time it is your turn again this round, take another rest token. (There is no reaction for other players.)
Soldier Phase
When all of the rest tiles have been taken, the Worker Phase ends and the Soldier Phase begins and you resolve battles. Resolve battles in the Great Tunnel first, and then in ascending number order of hexes. (Note that there aren’t any hex battles in the first round, just the Great Tunnel.)
Each hex has a certain number of collection spaces, which can hold one ant each (ants on these spaces “inhabit” that hex). If there are more ants than spaces in any hex, then a battle takes place. Each hex has one space that’s marked as a control space—the player in that space is the defender and other players with ants in that hex are invaders. Some hexes may also have centipedes present, in which case everyone must battle the centipede first, and then each other if there are still too many ants.
Your army size is your total number of ants in the hex. Every player may play one card face-down, which will add its ferocity level; each head evolution card you have also adds 1 ferocity. Whoever has the highest sum wins, and the defender wins ties. Each winner’s ant kills one of each loser’s ants. The losers’ ants each kill half a winner’s ant (round down); the winner cannot lose their last ant in the hex. Finally, the winner gets a point, and may move their ants into empty collection sites.
Some hexes also have centipedes on them, in which case everyone has to battle the centipede. The centipede has a starting army size shown on the score board, and then draws a card to add ferocity. If the card drawn has 1 ferocity, increase the centipede army size and draw again. If you defeat the centipede, you get a point and a food, and the centipede is removed from the board. Centipedes deal their army size in casualties (to each player) if they win, and half their army size if they lose.
The Great Tunnel doesn’t have any collection spots, so there will be a battle if there are at least two players in the tunnel. There aren’t invaders and defenders; instead, the players with the three highest sums will earn rewards shown on the current reward tile.
Queen Phase
First, everyone harvests—you gain whatever resources are associated with the collection sites that you occupy: food, larva, cards, or points. Then you must feed your ants: 1 food feeds 4 ants on the board (but each abdomen evolution card increases this number). Any ants that you cannot or choose not to feed are removed.
After feeding, everyone gains either 2 food or 5 larvae (except in the last round).
Slumber Phase
Each player gets a point for every hex they control that is adjacent to the Great Tunnel. You also get points for any of the Colony Goal cards that you currently fulfill. The round marker is advanced, and then it’s the next turn.
Discard all rest tiles and reveal a new set. Discard the current reward tile from the Great Tunnel and reveal the next one. Then start the next round.
Game End
The game ends after 4 rounds (or 5 in the long game).
After the last round, there’s some additional scoring. The player with the most larvae gets 2 points, the player with the most food gets 2 points, and the player with the most cards in hand gets 2 points. Note that if you did not feed all of your ants in the last round, you are not eligible for any of these bonuses.
Whoever has the most points wins, with ties going to the player who has the most ants on the map.
What’s New in the Evolved Edition
Here are some of the changes in the Evolved Edition; if you’re new to March of the Ants, you can probably skip this section.
The most obvious change is to the look of the game: all of the artwork and graphic design has been reworked, and some of the text on the player mats has been replaced with icons.
Much of the gameplay remains the same, but there have been a lot of tweaks, too. Colony goal cards have been overhauled: they now have multiple scoring options depending on how well you meet the conditions. There are also changes to many of the other card effects and costs to play them, as well as to the asymmetric species cards that you can add to your player board. The bonuses you get for having head and thorax cards has also been changed: head evolutions give you ferocity rather than extra army strength, and thorax evolutions let you place more larvae rather than moving faster.
Resting has changed, too. In the original edition, you gained 1 larva when you first rested, and then in subsequent turns you would continue to pass but gain food. Now, there are rest tiles and each time you rest, you take another tile and gain its effect. The Worker Phase now ends when all of the rest tiles are taken.
In the original version, the Great Tunnel was never contested and any number of players could inhabit it; now, there are battles in the Great Tunnel, with rewards determined by the tiles that were randomly drawn during setup. Centipede battles have also changed: they still draw cards from the top of the deck, but now there is also a centipede starting strength that increases every time a centipede is added to the map.
Feeding your ants has changed: instead of losing larva to keep your unfed ants, you now simply lose unfed ants, and you may choose to lose ants even when you have enough food to feed them.
Why You Should Play March of the Ants: Evolved Edition
Back when I was in high school, there was a computer game called Sim Ant (which is now over 30 years old, how did that happen?) where you got to play as an ant colony, trying to build up your colony and battle a rival colony. You explored and dug tunnels, collected food, and made teams of ants to tackle bigger enemies like caterpillars and spiders. Oh, and you also tried to drive the humans entirely out of their house.
March of the Ants isn’t really Sim Ant—there aren’t any humans, for one, and your explorations are only on the surface instead of digging out underground tunnels—but playing this game still brings up memories of that old videogame. Playing as an ant colony, figuring out how to get enough food to survive, battling other ants and centipedes, and hatching as many eggs as you can support … it’s a fascinating life at a tiny scale.
And, of course, there’s the evolution. There are so many different ant species with interesting abilities and features, and making your own mix-and-match ants is one of my favorite parts of this game. Want to travel faster? Try the flying thorax from Hymenoptera benii. Going for all-out warfare? Maybe the blasting head from Camponotus beauchampio will do the trick. Worried about centipedes? The betrayer abdomen from Diacamma baalke will help you avoid those battles. There are 33 unique evolution cards and each one is from a different species, so you can’t actually build a complete body from a single species—instead, you can look for combinations that synergize and help you achieve your colony goals. (I do wish more of the evolution cards had factoids about the different species, though, because it helps you connect the in-game abilities to their real-world counterparts.)
The new edition’s tweaks are nice—it still feels like the same game, but a decade’s worth of experience has allowed the designers to polish it a bit more, balancing out some of the costs and benefits of various cards. The rest tiles change the decision about when to rest: if there’s a bonus you’re particularly interested in, you have to decide whether to forgo some actions this round and quit early. Plus, anyone who rests will continue taking additional rest tiles if it comes back to their turn, which then puts some pressure on the other players to rest as well.
The centipede battles are another tweak that evens out the game a little more. In the original version, centipedes simply flipped two cards from the deck, meaning that their strength could be anywhere from 2 to 8, a wide spread that is very unpredictable. Now, they have a base size that gradually grows over the course of the game, so you can get a better read about what you might be up against and you can make your decisions accordingly.
One of the things that I liked about the game ten years ago was the way that you could take different approaches to victory, and that still holds up now. It’s a 4X game—Explore, Expand, Exploit, and Exterminate—and each of those offers different avenues to score points (though generally you may need to do at least a little of everything). Controlling hexes near the Great Tunnel can score you points, so early exploration is nice for that, but exterminating other ants to take control is another option. Expanding to put more ants on the board helps with battles and just getting to more collection spaces to gather resources, but make sure you have enough to feed your armies or they die off! Exploit is usually the “tech tree” part of 4X games, and in this case it’s the cards, particularly the evolution cards: evolving gives you abilities that can help with the other Xs, but also can score you points in themselves. Colony goals can also have a big impact: most of them can score up to 3 points per round if you fulfill them, so if you manage to get some goals played early on and maintain them, they can really add up—and they can also help focus your efforts toward a specific strategy.
March of the Ants was the game that launched Weird City Games, and since then they’ve published several other great nature-themed titles like Canopy and Leaf. It’s great that they’re revisiting March of the Ants now—it’s still an excellent game, and I think this new edition will help it find some new fans. If you like the idea of an ant-themed exploration game, check it out!
For more information or to make a pledge, visit the March of the Ants: Evolved Edition Kickstarter page!
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Disclosure: GeekDad was loaned a prototype of this game for review purposes.
