Dominant Species is a game that abstractly explores a small part of history: the advance of the Ice Age and what that means for living things trying to adapt to the slowly changing Earth.

Each player takes on the role of one of six major animal classes: mammal, reptile, bird, amphibian, arachnid or insect. Each begins the game more or less in a state of natural balance with respect to each other. But that will not last: it is the "survival of the fittest".

Through cunning action placement, players will strive to become dominant on as many different terrain tiles as possible to perform powerful card effects. Players will also want to spread their individual species to earn victory points for their animal. Players will be assisted in these efforts through speciation, migration and adaptation actions, among others.

All this ultimately leads to the endgame in which the player who has collected the most victory points will have their animal crowned Dominant Species.