Review Fix Exclusive: Inside ‘Evolution: Climate’

Review Fix chats with Bree Woodward, Art Director, North Star Games, who discusses the development cycle of “Evolution: Climate.”

About the Game:

Evolution: Climate, the ultimate edition adding game-changing weather events and mighty temperature shifts to the strategy game adaptation Evolution Board Game, messes with meteorology on Nintendo Switch as well as Steam for Windows PC and Mac on Wednesday, July 14, 2021.

Choose from multitudes of genetic traits and play them on your species to help them forage for food or fend off carnivores who view them as a potential meal. Adapt to the added element of weather conditions as constant climate shifts bring blistering heat, biting cold, and ultimately era-ending natural disasters forcing every species to evolve… or die.

Review Fix: How was this game born?

Bree Woodward: Changes in the climate have been one of the greatest drivers of evolutionary change for over 3 billion years, so we started thinking about how to implement it into the Evolution game system.  Species have developed fantastic adaptations like hibernating through winters, huge cooling frills that scare off predators, and migratory patterns that cross thousands of miles each year. Additionally, cataclysmic disasters like large meteor impacts make for great thematic content.  There is something epic about a meteor that can wipe out most of the plant life on earth. It makes for memorable gameplay.

Review Fix: What is your role in the game?

Woodward: My role is Art Director, and my job is to make sure the visual experience is pleasing and delightful.  I make sure that the digital game highlights the beautiful original watercolor artwork in the board game, and effects like Nocturnal, Heat Wave, or Cold Snap are impactful and give you a real sense of change in the environment. 

Review Fix: What has development been like?

Woodward: Adding events into the game was a lot of fun.  We sat around thinking about all of the natural disasters that could hit and all of the ways life can be wiped out.  

Review Fix: What makes this game special?

Woodward: Each game of Evolution: Climate creates a vibrant ecosystem that tells an epic story, and varies dramatically from game to game. The food chains mimic something you might find in real life, sparking the imagination of nature enthusiasts (as well as professors of evolutionary biology), but it’s the diversity of core strategic gameplay that keeps gamers interested game after game.

Review Fix: What games influenced this one the most?

Woodward: The card play is most similar to Hearthstone, but the natural theme was inspired by Spore.

Review Fix: Any fun stories or wild moments during development?

Woodward: I recall one early game where the game encouraged movement to the extremes, and the Climate Track got pinned at Ice Age. One player managed to go the whole game without his species surviving a single round.  We figured that’s a little too extreme and found a mechanic that caused it to be more dynamic.  

Review Fix: What were the major lessons learned?

Woodward: Localizing a game across 12 languages was a huge challenge. From removing all baked-in English text in art assets, to sourcing translators (thank you, translator community!), and solving for extra long words in tight spaces (here’s looking at you, Germany!), it was a herculean effort to bring the game to audiences all over the world.

Review Fix: The marketplace is crowded. How do you think you stand out?

Woodward: There’s no shortage of “faithful adaptations” of digital board games that reflect the board game experience accurately.  Climate is very much a faithful adaptation but it stands out because it’s streamlined and simplified. We have added loads of delightful touches that make the experience come alive and play even faster in the digital version. You can get more hours of play in and test many more strategies, and always have players to play against online.

Review Fix: How have your previous experiences in the industry helped this game?

Woodward: We learned a lot when developing Evolution and Oceans digital games, and when developing Climate we had far more experience than we did when we were a fledgling digital studio 5 years ago.  I think this sped up the development process, and we implemented systems that helped with iteration and testing. We’re getting faster and better at this. 

Review Fix: How do you want this game to ultimately be remembered?

Woodward: I would love for this game to be remembered as not only a faithful adaptation of the board game, but an improvement on the experience, and a “classic” that people return to again and again for its beauty, speed, and endless combinations of strategies of play. 

Review Fix: What’s next?

Woodward: Nothing public yet, but we do believe the card play systems that the Evolution line has started are ripe for further exploration.  

Review Fix: Anything else you’d like to add?

Woodward: Evolution: Climate mixes engaging gameplay with a theme that mirrors nature. It has not only won many awards for its strategic gameplay, but it has been used in the evolutionary biology department at the University of Oxford and covered favorably by many scientific journals including Nature, Science Magazine, and the International Journal of Organic Evolution.

mm
About Patrick Hickey Jr. 13819 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

Be the first to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.


*