Humanity's evolution as a species has accelerated over the last 30,000-40,000 years in a manner unparalleled in the evolution of life on Earth. What triggered this change? Genetic mutation? Probably not. Our brains and anatomy have remained relatively unchanged for 4 million years. An encounter with different hominid species? Perhaps...

Play solo against AI, with others locally or against other players online. This digital version of the board game Neanderthal also includes an introductory tutorial to the game which will make it easier to learn Neanderthal. Useful both for playing the app and for when you want to play the physical version of the game.

This is a thematic game where you as a player, will play through the critical epoch during which this change occurred. After millions of years of an uninterrupted, modest nomadic existence, we suddenly developed complex language, began forming tribes and building villages. You play as one of the human species existing at that time. The game system enables you to follow your tribe's evolution as well as that of the environment in which you live. The three players you can represent are the Archaic Man (Player Green), Neanderthal (Player Yellow), and Cro-Magnon (Player Red) species fighting to survive in Europe during the last glacial maximum from 45,000 to 35,000 years ago. You begin the game vocal (i.e. words for speech but not ideas) and with a sexuality (promiscuous, harem, or pair bonding).

NEANDERTHAL SEQUENCE OF PLAY

(six phases per turn)[

1. EVENT & CULTURE AUCTION.
Reveal a daughter card to begin the turn. This indicates the first player and the turn’s event icons applied top to bottom to all players.
2. HUNTER ASSIGNMENT. All players assign their unassigned tribesmen to hunt biomes, become Elders, or perform courtships.
3. NEGOTIATIONS, ATTACKS, & GATHERING.
Bribes. As long as one of the negotiators has a Chief, players can bribe others to peacefully withdraw Hunters from contested biomes, including marrying them to their daughters (F1).
Attack Roll. Players must use their Hunters to attack other Hunters on the same card (F2).
Gathering species add one Baby for each gathering biome (F3) they occupy.
4. ROLL FOR HUNT. All players make hunt rolls, rolling one dice for each of their assigned Hunters.
5. DOMESTIC ANIMALS. Each mature in your tableau gives you the Babies and frees the disks specified.
6. SPECIES ACTIONS. You may perform one action:
Portal Action (vocal only) adds one portal disk from your vocabulary to your brain map.
Neolexia Action (vocal only) frees one dedicated disk to your vocabulary.
Elder Action (tribal only). To perform an Elder Action, you need an Elder of the proper rank.

Category: Card Game, Economic, Prehistoric
Main mechanism Auction/Bidding, Dice Rolling, Events, Negotiation, Simulation, Worker Placement