Gameplay & Design
Doomlings is an excellent pick-up-and-play card game that blends charming aesthetics with clever mechanics. In this compact, trait-drafting game, players build quirky little creatures—Doomlings—by collecting and playing "traits" that grant points and unique abilities. Your goal is to evolve your Doomlings as best you can before the apocalypse hits.
The core mechanics are straightforward yet satisfying. Each round, players draft and play traits from their hands, building their collection and strategizing around how traits interact. The number of cards you can hold is determined by your gene pool, which can shift depending on the traits you've played and the current "Era" card in play. These Era cards add rule twists or global effects to each round, creating dynamic shifts that keep players adapting.
One of the strengths of Doomlings is how seamlessly it blends elements of trading card games (TCGs) and board games. There's a collectible aspect with booster packs that introduce new traits, much like a TCG, but the game structure and player interaction lean more toward accessible tabletop strategy.
Turns are simple: follow the current Era’s rule, play a trait (or more, depending on your abilities), and pass the turn. The game continues through three ages, each ending when a Doomsday Era appears. At the end of the third age, players total up their points to determine the winner.
The mechanics are easy to teach, making Doomlings a great entry point for casual gamers or groups with varying experience levels. It’s portable, quick to set up, and fun in any setting—I've even started keeping it in my car for spontaneous game nights.
And let’s not forget the theme: it's irresistibly cute. These wide-eyed Doomlings are evolving in vain as the world crumbles around them, and it’s strangely endearing watching them do their best before the inevitable end.
Replayability
Doomlings shines when it comes to replayability. Its short playtime and accessible rules make it a game you’ll want to return to often, whether as a quick filler or a game-night staple. No two games play the same thanks to the variety of Era and trait cards, and the way each player's choices interact with those global effects ensures fresh strategies every time.
The base game alone offers a solid amount of variety, but the replay value skyrockets with the available expansions. These packs introduce new traits, new types of cards (like Catastrophes or Mythics), and even alternate game modes that modify how long each age lasts or how chaotic the rules become. Some expansions add new win conditions or unique mechanics, which completely shift the gameplay dynamics and offer new strategic angles.
Feedback
One issue I’ve noticed is the balance between the number of trait cards and the number of Era cards. With such a large pool of traits and relatively few Eras in play each game, it sometimes feels like the unique twists and global effects the Eras bring don’t have enough impact on the overall gameplay. I often find myself wishing for more guaranteed variation in how each round plays out—either through more Era cards per session, or mechanics that cycle through them more rapidly. The charm of the game lies in its unpredictability, but a little more structure or a wider variety of in-game modifiers could really help each game feel more distinct.
Additionally, the two-player mode could use some love. While it’s technically playable with two, it feels like the game is clearly designed with larger groups in mind. With fewer players, there's less interaction, fewer trait combos clashing, and less tension around drafting choices. Some sort of revised ruleset or official variant tailored specifically for two players would go a long way toward making it more engaging for smaller groups. Right now, it works—but it lacks the energy and dynamism that make the game shine in a group of three or more.
Verdict
Doomlings is a delightfully quirky card game that’s easy to learn, quick to play, and packed with charm. Its blend of trait-drafting strategy, evolving gameplay through Era cards, and collectible expansions makes it a strong choice for casual game nights and spontaneous sessions alike. While the two-player mode feels a bit underdeveloped and Era cards could have more impact per game, the core experience is still creative, satisfying, and endlessly replayable—especially with expansions. It may not be flawless, but it’s far from forgettable.
You can find Doomlings on Amazon on the Doomlings website. And if you’ll be at Gen Con or San Diego Comic Con you can find Doomlings in person where you’ll be able to get your hands on an exlcusive trait card.
