A common issue of media which relates or discusses evolution is to drift out of natural selection and such and fall into the Lamarckian paradigm. Not only is such behaviour apt to confuse the consumer regarding science and evolution, if it is applied to societies and cultures then it results in the propogation of racist ideals
While Thrive as it stands seems rather good about sticking to the science, the overall plan, namely the proposed system of ‘stages’, seems to have some issues with this, due to its linear, directed structure
One solution would be to do away with the stages in all that faces the player. This means that a simple beast must be equal to that of an empire in terms of progress
Another easier solution could be a tree or (preferably) a web of stages, rather than a directed chain. Perhaps this may be more complex upfront, and it won’t perfectly solve the problem, but I feel it could be a suitable compromise
What I mean is that there shouldn’t be anything in the game to tell or suggest that the player should choose one particular option (e.g. a tutorial pushing the player to go towards industrialization specifically)
What are on about? The game has to have a tutorial to tell the player how they advance through the game. I can imagine the constant questions otherwise about every single part of the game with people confused how they can advance in the game. Still that doesn’t have anything to do with Lamarckian evolution. The game is basically about the player being an intelligent designer for a single species.