In Microcosm, you enter the hidden world of microbial life, harnessing diverse microbes to recycle essential chemicals within a shared ecosystem. By deploying unique microbe cards, you transform resources, gain adaptive mutations, and carve out your ecological niche. Careful planning allows your mic...
In Microcosm, you enter the hidden world of microbial life, harnessing diverse microbes to recycle essential chemicals within a shared ecosystem. By deploying unique microbe cards, you transform resources, gain adaptive mutations, and carve out your ecological niche. Careful planning allows your microbes to grow and multiply, doubling their resources over time—but if a biome exceeds its carrying capacity, the entire cycle can collapse.
Players compete and collaborate to drive the carbon, nitrogen, iron, and sulfur cycles across different biomes. Over 12 rounds, players play microbe cards into biome tiles, where each microbe must be able to survive the biome’s environmental properties and access the necessary chemical resources to perform a metabolic reaction. When played, microbes convert chemical compounds (resources) from one form to another, beginning or extending a biochemical cycle with the goal of returning the chemical back to the form in the environment (for example, CO₂ → C → CO₂). Often playing cards relies on resources produced by other players’ microbes, creating a web of interdependence where timing and positioning are crucial.
