Start of Life

Cell Phase

Creature Phase

Tribal Phase

Civilization Phase

Space Phase

The first phase of existence, the cell phase, is sometimes referred to as the tide pool, cellular or microbial phase. The player guides simple protean microbes around in a 2D environment where it must deal with fluid dynamics, predators, and eating weaker microbes or plants. There are many different types of cells, many of which can damage and/or eat the player's microbe. Once the player's microbe has eaten several cells, the player can enter an editor in which the player can modify the appearance, shape, and abilities of the microbe by spending "DNA points". A player may choose to remove some part from the microbe during this and the next phase, which will recoup some DNA points. If the creature dies, the player may restart from an earlier evolution.

As the microbe gets larger, objects that are in the background will move to the foreground, which can result in one's microbe being eaten by a much more massive microbe that had previously been swimming in the background. The surface land becomes more and more prominent, and the option to move to land eventually presents itself, allowing the creature to crawl out of the tide pool to begin the creature phase. Legs are not a prerequisite to moving to land; if the creature lacks legs, it will move in a slug-like fashion, which implies there will be an uninterrupted transition between the cellular and creature phases. The microbe resembles a strange insect with cartoonish, human-like eyes, which were used "to make it cute."

The main unit of "currency", which allows the creature to move on to the next phase, are "DNA Points."