Welcome to the forums, Syncient! I appreciate the thoughfulness of the post and, while not willing to delve on this topic, I want to give some of my opinions on it.[1]
It seems that a major theme of Thrive is how the species will shape and adapt to the world they live in. Organisms will change the atmospheric composition and then try to survive on it. They will find niches and thrive in them. There is a lot of potential for replayability, and the Society and Industrial Stages can be as varied as the previous ones: there are many ways that a species can achieve civilization.[2] However, while I don’t think that the path to progress will become too restrictive, the game should definitely warn the player if the creature can’t be part of a society;[3] there are many ways, apparently.
This kind of thinking reminds me of the Tech Editor discussion where some people argued for a liberal implementation of technology in the game, but later there was a consensus to implement a tech web. In my opinion, this could give the game (another) differential, vary the playthoughs and elevate the complexity of the stage.
Honestly, this makes hyped for the “strategies stages” of the game. Usually I’m more excited for the Multicellular and Aware, but knowing that those stages can be as unique as the others makes me hopeful.[4]
Even if I’m more used to making belgiumposts. ↩︎
Or “species” in the plural. Imagine how different animal societies might interact with each other if creating a civilization isn’t too hard to achieve in the game. ↩︎
Say this word like Bill Wurtz would. ↩︎
I’m sorry if this rambling doesn’t make any sense, haha. ↩︎