Updated Evolution – Doomlings 3rd Edition Review

A couple of years ago, someone from Doomlings Inc reached out to me and asked me if I’d be interested in reviewing the second (I presume, though I thought it was the first!) edition of this cool new card game where you are a race of beings on some planet trying to evolve as greatly as possible before the world inevitably ends.

It sounded neat, so I jumped at the chance.

Now, two years later, a third edition of the game is out and I was once again offered a copy for a fair and honest review.

The game was designed by James Meyer and Andrew Meyer, with artwork by Andrew Meyer (I assume, though there is not a separate BGG entry for the 3rd Edition so I’m only assuming it’s the same).

The third edition of Doomlings was published in 2026 and has updated artwork on everything, some card tweaking (also with some cards removed and some new cards added) and the rules sheet has been completely revamped.

The game rules themselves haven’t changed, so it was easy to get a bunch of my co-workers around the table (who already like the game) and take it out for a test drive.

What were our opinions?

Let’s take a look.

I’m not going to go into great detail about how to play the game, since I did that in my original review and, like I said, nothing has really changed.

I’m just going to talk about the changes and whether they are good or bad.

The first thing I have to call out is the rules sheet itself.

After much feedback from community partners (including me, apparently, though any of my feedback would have been in the form of questions and rules clarifications that I asked my contacts there, who have all answered very quickly), the rules sheet was completely revamped.

The rules are the same, but they are presented in a much clearer fashion, answering many of the edge cases (but not always, which is almost impossible to do anyway).

Just one minor example of that.

When the 3rd Catastrophe hits, the game immediately ends and you start the World’s End process, which needs to go in turn order.

I had asked whether the first player changes after the catastrophe, like it does after the first two catastrophes, because the rules never actually said.

The new rule sheet does, saying that first player doesn’t change!

I’m sure others had that question too, but I like to think I contributed at least somewhat.

The sheet has some examples of play that really make the game easier to learn on the fly as well.

Not that it’s a hard game anyway, but still.

The new rules also offer a couple of official variants, though I haven’t tried those yet.

Secondly, the new card design is phenomenal.

I love how the name of the card is also at the bottom (in case you want to stack traits on top of each other) and also the points (and any special symbol, like World’s End, Action, Scoring, etc) are also at the top in case you want to stack the opposite way.

Having this encourages you to limit your table space footprint by stacking your traits of the same colour.

You do have to leave the text visible a little bit, just so you (and others) can see any effects that they might want to steal or use (like +1 Gene Pool).

I notice that the colours are a bit bolder as well, which makes them more vibrant and pleasant to look at on the table.

One of my co-workers likes the old art better than the new art, but it’s all the same style so I think that’s more of a card-by-card comparison than an overall thing.

The art is still good.

Then there is the card tweaking, with either some changes made to how some of the cards work, or just rewording of the card to make it clearer what it does.

One perfect example of tweaking, which in this case I think makes the game better, is the Viral card.

In the previous version of the game, you could use Viral to target a specific player. You would choose a colour and everybody would lose one point for each trait of that colour.

If Bryan has 5 blue cards while everybody else only has 2, well, Bryan is my arch-nemesis so of course I’m choosing that.

The new Viral now just says everybody loses a point for each trait of their most common colour.

No choices, but also no targeting.

Also, the update means that players can’t avoid the effect.

Previously, you declared the colour at World’s End, but then if somebody had a World’s End power to (for example) change all of their blue cards to purple, then they could avoid it.

Now they can’t.

Card tweaking also carried over to the cards with special symbols for scoring, rather than an actual number.

Swarms and Kidneys both have been changed so that they are now just worth zero points, but then +1 for each Swarm on the table, or +1 for each Kidney in your trait pile, including it.

This eliminates confusion with cards that have something to do with the face value of other traits in your trait pile.

Now these have a face value of zero rather than…whatever the hell that was.

Some cards have been radically changed, like Viral above, but also Apex Predator.

Now it’s worth 2 base points instead of 4, but it also gives you the opportunity for even more points (depending on the number of players).

That’s a bit more of a potentially overpowered card now, because if you’re in a 6-player game, that’s suddenly a 14-point card instead of just an 8-point card.

That’s huge!

For some reason I can’t fathom, they’ve also added two multicolour cards.

All four colours are represented, but I’m curious as to why they did that.

I get that they would want to keep (even if they tweak) as many cards from the original as possible, but multicolour cards were a big addition in at least one (if not more) of the expansions to the original game.

Now we get just two?

And they don’t have any effects, so they just seem extraneous.

Not a big deal, but just eh for me.

There were a few tweaks to the ages, though nothing huge.

The Age of Nietzsche was changed so that you do end up stabilizing at the end of your turn, with the effect happening at the start of the age rather than on your turn itself.

Some were removed but only a few were added.

The new ones are quite interesting, though.

I love how Lonely Age nullifies those cards that let you play additional cards, at least for that round.

There were no changes or tweaks to the catastrophes, though I believe they did take a couple of them out.

Overall, there are 160 cards in this new edition and there were 167 cards in the previous one.

So they definitely took out more than they put in, but there are still some new traits that are pretty cool.

Interestingly enough, red has no new cards! Just removed and tweaked ones.

I wonder why.

Finally, the box is smaller than the original, which is both good and bad.

Good in that it’s much more portable, but bad in that there is literally no room for any expansions in this box.

You can see the new box at the top of this review.

Speaking of expansions, all of the previous expansions are compatible with the new edition (same card backs), though there will obviously be a mismatch on the traits themselves. The expansions won’t have the new card design on them.

As long as that doesn’t mess with your OCD, you’re fine to incorporate whichever ones you want.

I also didn’t compare the two card backs, so I don’t know if there are any “they aren’t quite the same colour so I can tell that it’s one or the other” issues.

Overall, I’m very happy with the 3rd edition of Doomlings and I’m glad I have it.

Do you need to upgrade if you have the previous edition?

The card tweaks, the new card design, and the new cards are very cool.

But if you’re satisfied with what you have, I don’t see a huge urge to go out and upgrade.

If you’re new to Doomlings, though, you should definitely get the 3rd edition.

You will be much happier, it will be easier to learn, and your quality of life will be much better.

(This review was written after 2 plays with the new edition. A copy of Doomlings 3rd Edition was received from the company in exchange for a fair and honest review)