Hunt.
Hunting is the key driving element of emergent play in Primitives. To survive the player will have to hunt animals at some point, as the leather and bone collected from their carcasses is vital in expanding of ones camp and crafting tools. Hunting in primitives requires the player to locate animals, whether by sound or by sight. After the prey has been located your spear must fly true, for animals will scatter at the sound of a spear thudding to the ground nearby, as they will if the player comes too close.
However the player and his tribe can also be hunted. While a fireplace may keep the predators at bay at night, there are still scripted and dynamic events that can end with a poor tribe member or even the leader himself stuck in a wolves belly, or worse. There is a chance for a large pack of wolves to invade the camp, hunting and killing everything in their path. In addition the apex predator himself has a chance to hunt down the players camp, and either steal food from a storage or kill a lone tribe member.
Predators can also hunt prey throughout the world. Sometimes you might notice a wolf chasing a deer and in its terror the deer flees through the middle of your camp, attracting the wolf to you or one of your tribe members. In addition a crafty leader could attract the ire of a wolf or ant and lead it to a herd of mammoth or deer, letting the predator do your work for you then cleaning up the remains afterwards.
Gather
Gathering is the next key element in primitives game play. To survive and expand, you will require a lot of different resources to build new buildings and craft new tools. Scattered throughout the world players can find various sources of Food, Wood, Stone, Leather and Bone. Food is the most important resource in the game, without it you will starve. The more tribe members you have, the more food you will need so it is always important to keep stocked up. Wood is used as a crafting material for nearly everything in the game. In addition the Fireplace requires a constant supply of wood at night to stay burning. Stone, leather and bone are more advanced crafting materials, used for more advanced tools and buildings. To begin with the tribe leader can happily gather everything he needs to support himself, but if you want to expand and eventually take on the apex predator you will need a large, well equipped tribe.
To expand your tribe you will need to build new buildings. The more huts you build, the more tribe members will flock to these new homes. New tribe members can be ordered to gather for you. If you can manage your tribe well, it frees the player to explore new areas or clear out nearby predators. Eventually you may exhaust the surrounding resources from your initial camp and move on and when this time comes you must make sure you have enough food to survive the journey to a new area.
Survive
Survival is the combination of the last two elements and what makes Primitives fun to play (in our humble opinion). To survive the player must master hunting and gathering, at first just for them self but in time you must ensure the survival of a whole tribe. It is never enough to just survive, you should always be looking for ways to prosper, whether it is seeking more fertile lands to survive, by culling nearby predators to keep your tribe safe or eventually by ending the threat of the apex predator once and for all.
We hope that this article has been helpful for players to understand what makes up Primitives. We hope you enjoy the game as much as we do!
