We Need More Humans asks how many people an alien invasion really needs

I don't need to tell anyone how much I love incremental games by this point. Numbers go brr, dopamine, yada yada yada. It's hardly surprising that my Steam store home page is essentially a rotating source of temptation with games from my favorite genre, and X is about the same. So when We Need More Humans was released, you can bet I dove straight in. 

We Need More Humans is an incremental game by Matt Cole, aka Seafront Games, all about abducting humans. You, as the flagship of the alien invasion, need to suck increasingly large numbers of people into your tractor beam, use them as your primary source of income, and buy upgrades. I expected all of that. What I didn't expect was the sheer level of chaos that this game provides. 

The theory of evolution

Like all incrementals, We Need More Humans starts pretty slow; almost leisurely compared to what it eventually ends up becoming. Your little UFO enters a tiny village of tiny people to abduct them from their lives for no apparent reason other than financial gain and upgrades that will lead to planetary domination. 

One upgrade stands out among the rest: evolution. Sure, you can boost your beam and add more population, but the real money maker here is evolving your humans through the ranks. The evolutionary line includes wizards, topless chads, samurai warriors, and more. There doesn't seem to be any logical progression through real-life time periods, but I think that's what makes the evolution upgrade stand out. 

You never know what's going to come next. 

Into the thick of it

It was about the point at which the above picture was taken when I stopped viewing the little things on my screen as people, and started seeing them as a writhing mass of colors like rainbow TV static. Things took on a more satisfying note, because suddenly I felt less like a UFO and more like a vacuum cleaner getting rid of the mess. 

We Need More Humans quickly reaches a point where you'll find yourself thinking, “I'm honestly not sure we do.” It becomes impossible to tell one human from the next, and even harder to make a marginal dent in a location's population. The whole image turns into a magic eye picture, complete with hidden objects that happen to be boosts. 

At one point I fully completed my initiation as UFO pilot by abducting a cow. I didn't see the cow; I only know it happened because I got an achievement for doing it. That's how chaotic things get in We Need More Humans, and it's frankly brilliant. 

Black holes and street sweepers

Through the upgrade tree, once your abducted humans are earning you a fair few dollars per abductee, you can unlock some passive upgrades that only add to the chaos, such as black holes, asteroids, and street sweepers. What starts as a relatively peaceful alien invasion rapidly descends into the kind of annihilation that could destroy solar systems. 

Asteroids come flying in at random while black holes pop out of your cursor at timed intervals, landing in the mass of shuffling humans and throwing them into whatever void awaits. Throw in some street sweepers that suck in anything that happens to be in their path, and you've got all the ingredients for absolute insanity right there on screen. 

The street sweepers can be charged up too, throwing out a laser beam in front of them if you hover over them long enough. This beam completely disintegrates any of the tiny people that happen to be panicking down the road, and it's a particularly satisfying thing to witness when your population hits 20,000+. If only the road would clear that quickly during rush hour. 

UFO cosmetic surgery

One thing I wasn't expecting in We Need More Humans was the ability to unlock cosmetics, and oh boy, there's something addictive about turning your UFO into a murderous little representation of yourself. Mine is a little cube with a bright pink tractor beam. I'm not sure what that says about me, but it sure is pretty to look at. 

You can unlock new skins for your UFO and beam by simply abducting more people. Now that I think about it, the name makes more sense. I do need more humans, even if just for the purposes of unlocking new skins. If nothing else, we now know I'd make a great alien overlord if the position ever became available. 

We Need More Humans was released on September 1, 2026, and I strongly recommend you go and play it through Steam if you're a fan of incrementals. After all, those UFO cosmetics aren't going to unlock themselves.