Primarch
Eras
A life, in any time.
Born by chance, from the Stone Age to the stars.
A life simulation spanning fifty thousand years. You are born somewhere in history — you don't choose where — and you live one year at a time until you don't.
Free to play, with ads · iOS & Android · No account needed
Life no. 1
Tala Firekeeper
The Stone Age
Born in the Highlands, 7897 BCE
Paid in pelts
House Firekeeper · Portrait at 30
Free to play, with ads · iOS & Android · No account needed
The life above is a sample from a few of the game's own places and names. Its figure is the game's own portrait, which the game paints flat; any depth you see is this page's.
You do not choose the century.
You only choose what to do with it.
A life simulation spanning fifty thousand years. You are born somewhere in history — you don't choose where — and you live one year at a time until you don't.
Every life begins with a roll of the dice — an age, a country, a family, a body. From there it is yours: work, study, love, scheme, travel, fight, build a fortune or squander one. Health, happiness, intellect, strength and charisma rise and fall with every decision, and every year you age up is written into the log.
Try a few years
A life, written down
as you live it.
Every year leaves a line in the log. Some of them you'll want back.
Tala Firekeeper
- Age 0Tala Firekeeper is born in the Highlands during the Stone Age.
- Age 2Tala Firekeeper turned 2.
- Tala Firekeeper took a first wobbling walk, and Garu Firekeeper let go one finger at a time.
- Age 4Tala Firekeeper turned 4.
- Tala Firekeeper puts names to fire, water, and kin.
- Age 8Tala Firekeeper turned 8.
-
A moment arrives: A Wolf at the Edge of Camp
A pup, half-starved, watches Tala Firekeeper from the dark.
- Win its trust: Tala Firekeeper earns a shadow that will guard the camp for years. happiness up 2 charisma up 1
- Drive it off: Tala Firekeeper hurls a stone, and the wild stays wild. strength up 1
- Age 11Tala Firekeeper turned 11.
- Dawn comes and the flame still burns. Tala Firekeeper has earned trust.
- Age 18Tala Firekeeper turned 18.
- Tala Firekeeper married Rann Stoneson.
- Age 34Tala Firekeeper turned 34.
- Tala Firekeeper becomes the memory of the band.
The rest is unwritten.
A web page can only hold so much of a life. In the game, chance deals your own, and you keep going, one year at a time, until you don't.
An excerpt. The quiet years are skipped; in the game you live every year, one Age Up at a time.
Live it year by year
A handful of actions a year, so choose them well. Work a trade, chase an education, court someone, take a risk. The year ends when you age up, and whatever you didn't get to is simply gone.
Nine Ages
Fifty thousand years,
one year at a time.
Each age has its own trades, currencies, dangers and colours — pelts in the Highlands, cuneiform in Mesopotamia, a shopfront in the far future. Your house can cross from one into the next.
The Stone Age, 50,000–3001 BCE (your sample life began here)
In the case A pressure-flaked flint point. Leaf-shaped points like this were knapped in western Europe some 20,000 years ago.
Survival, fire, and the hunt.
- Work
- Forager, Hunter, Toolmaker, Shaman, Fisher
- Coin
- pelts in the Highlands
- ochre in the Painted Caves
- shells on the Coastlands
- obsidian on the Warm Peninsula
- From the log
Dawn comes and the flame still burns. Ila Riverkin has earned trust.
The Bronze Age, 3000–801 BCE (your sample life began here)
In the case A clay tablet pressed with a reed. Cuneiform began in Sumer around 3200 BCE and outlasted this whole age. The wedges drawn here are decorative, not a real text.
The first cities, kings, and written words.
- Work
- Field Hand, Potter, Weaver, Scribe, Temple Priest, Soldier
- Coin
- shekels in Mesopotamia
- silver rings in Elam
- myrrh in the Land of Punt
- cattle in the Sahel Herdlands
- From the log
Ninti of Uruk copies wedge after wedge until the lamp gutters.
The Roman Empire, 800 BCE–499 CE (your sample life began here)
In the case A silver denarius. Rome struck it from about 211 BCE, and it served Rome for more than four centuries.
Glory, marble, and the weight of an empire.
- Work
- Farmer, Craftsman, Merchant, Legionary (Decanus to Legate), Senator (noble birth)
- Coin
- denarii in every province, from Britannia to Judaea
- From the log
The Blues take the day, and Marcus Valerius leaves hoarse and jubilant.
The Middle Ages, 500–1449 (your sample life began here)
In the case A heater shield, split down the middle. Shields of this shape were carried from about 1200, and a field divided in two is among heraldry's oldest designs.
Faith, fief, and the turning of the seasons.
- Work
- Serf, Blacksmith, Monk, Merchant, Knight (noble birth)
- Coin
- silver pennies in England
- pfennigs in the Holy Roman Empire
- bezants in Byzantium
- cowries on the Swahili Coast
- From the log
Cecily Fletcher slays a great wyrm made of hay and imagination.
The Renaissance, 1450–1699 (your sample life began here)
In the case A printed book with brass clasps. Printing with movable type spread across Europe from the 1450s, as this age began.
Art, discovery, and a wider, harsher world.
- Work
- Apprentice, Artist, Merchant, Sailor (to Captain), Soldier (to Musketeer)
- Coin
- pounds in England
- akçe in the Ottoman Empire
- salt bars in the Ethiopian Empire
- wampum in the Eastern Woodlands
- From the log
Ginevra da Siena learns to see the world as a painter does.
The Industrial Age, 1700–1910 (your sample life began here)
In the case A cast-iron gear wheel. Iron gearing drove the mills and engines of the late 1700s and 1800s.
Smoke, steam, and the iron rhythm of the machine.
- Work
- Factory Worker, Coal Miner, Clerk, Engineer, Foreman, Shopkeeper
- Coin
- pounds in Britain
- kuruş in the Sublime Porte
- cash coins in Qing China
- From the log
Sarah Hughes watches the world blur past a carriage window.
The Atomic Age, 1911–1992 (your sample life began here)
In the case A radio valve. Vacuum tubes like this lit radios from the 1920s until transistors replaced them.
Rockets, revolutions, and the shadow of the bomb.
- Work
- Factory Worker, Office Clerk, Teacher, Engineer, Auto Mechanic, Pilot (to Astronaut)
- Coin
- dollars in the United States
- yen in Japan
- rupees in India
- pesos in Mexico
- From the log
Jack Miller's backyard launch singes the lawn and thrills the block.
The Modern Age, 1993–2099 (your sample life began here)
In the case A touchscreen phone. Glass-fronted smartphones arrived in 2007 and reached billions within a decade.
A connected world of screens, offices, debt, and possibility.
- Work
- Retail Associate, Barista, Electrician, Nurse, Software Engineer, Lawyer, Physician
- Coin
- yen in Japan
- naira in Nigeria
- rubles in Russia
- dong in Vietnam
- From the log
Hina Tanaka buys the next person's drink. The feeling spreads.
The Far Future, 2100–2500 (your sample life began here)
In the case A ringed world. Saturn's largest moon, Titan, is one of the places a Far Future life can begin.
A spacefaring age of neural minds and distant colonies.
- Work
- Drone Technician, Colonist, Habitat Technician, Void Pilot, Neural Engineer, AI Ethicist
- Coin
- credits everywhere, from the Lunar Domes to the Kuiper Outposts
- From the log
Nova Halcyon builds impossible castles with friends from three worlds.
From the game
Seven screens,
seven ages.
The Stone Age Every life begins where chance puts it: here, the Painted Caves in 15220 BCE, where wealth is counted in ochre. 
The Roman Empire Moments arrive unannounced and wait for an answer. 
The Middle Ages Your stats, a painted glimpse of where you live, and the year written down line by line. 
The Renaissance A house outlives its founder. Isabel is the second generation of House Mason, born after the age turned. 
The Industrial Age Turning points are drawn as small scenes: a first day at work in Britain, 1867. 
The Atomic Age Stay, or try your luck abroad: every destination lists its taxes, living costs and your chance of entry. 
The Far Future Four centuries on, the shopfronts have changed. Every price is in credits, earned in the game and never bought.
After you
Death is not the end of the save.
Your heir inherits the name, the legacy score and the honours you earned — and carries the line forward, sometimes into an age you never saw.
House Firekeeper · from 7897 BCE
Illustration. Heirs carry a house forward; where it goes is up to you.
An heir takes the name.
Continue as one of your children. With none, a distant relative takes up the name.
The estate passes down.
A share of the money, or all of it if a will names them, along with the house's relics and heirlooms.
The house keeps score.
Every finished life adds to its legacy: wealth, fame, honours, children raised with care.
Some works outlast a lifetime.
Great Works usually take more than one generation to finish.
The clock keeps running.
The world year never resets. When it passes an age's end, the living cross into the next.
The coin changes its name.
Money is converted by what it would buy, and your trade carries on as similar work in the new age.
No. 10Your life · Age, place and name to be drawn
Where you're born is chance. What survives of you is not.
Somewhere in history, a life is waiting.
Admission free, with ads · iOS & Android · No account or sign-in · Your saves stay on your device