No reason to split, bad idea of having the microbe follow the mouse but needing to click the buttons to get a speed boost, etc. Turning is too slow, when you split your allies don't do anything useful, etc. Could be good. Isn't.
Game seems awful. Documentation is weak and the difficulty in robbers scales way too fast. After my 2nd town I encountered a band of 6 robbers. I managed to kill them, started walking again, and out of nowhere I was dead. I had food, water, forage, etc. I just got "You are dead." on themap screen.