Is it a toy... or a board game? A short introduction to Wingspan

[Lanthanotus]

Reading daily here, but right now contributing only very rarely as I am very busy around my job, house, family and association. Now, especially my affection to the last one made my mother in law (yes!) making me a gift just for good and tunred up with a board game that indeed hooked me up after I eventually found the time to work myself in. Since that, I play a session almost daily. Now, I know there`s some birders around here too, so I thought I introduce to you.... Wingspan (In German it`s called Flügelschlag, wing beat).

It`s a luxuriosly outfitted board game for up to five players. The original game is dedicated to the North American bird species and includes 170 individual bird cards with a great variety of species, each with varying attributes and abilities. There are two expansions which provide even more cards (Europe 71, Oceania 95) and new game features. According to the description by the authors, the bird data was worked out using ressources of Cornell Lab of Ornithology, a world renowned organisation for research and conservation.


The game is not uncomplicated, but a very nice challenge for a dedicated player and in fact the many different ways in which victory points are gathered and have to be used throughout the game, makes it hard to predict who will win in the end. So strategy can only go so far. This keeps the game quite thrilling in my opinion, even when played alone....., yes, you can play the game solo. "Always know your target group" and so Wingspan includes cards that allow you to play against an (analogue) bot opponent, a so called Automa. I however play it alone in the classic fashion with just three boards for three players which all are me. While in that way I cannot loose, the game is nevertheless exciting to the last in most sessions as the final victor often enough cannot surely predicted if all players are "equally" played.



My only complain on the game may be that some of my favorite European birds are not included and that the Bird of Paradise for an unknown reason has a completly nonsense wingspan of 20 cm....

...otherwise .... highly recommend!

[Dusty Wren]

I'll second the recommendation. Wingspan is a great game!

It's worth mentioning that there's a version for the computer as well (link to the Steam page for those interested). You don't get all the lovely game boards and pieces, obviously, but the digital version keeps the beautiful illustrations and adds simple animations and bird calls. Plus, you can play games with people who live a couple hundred miles away, which is helpful when most of your friends don't live close enough to stop in for a game

[stargatedalek]

This is a wonderful game, and the expansions for it are great too! Hopefully the Steam version adds those in time (have both versions).

[sbell]

I also have the base game (with the SwiftStart, a later addition on the first reissue). I haven't picked up the expansions yet.

One thing about this game--they are produced in small batches, and can be really, really difficult to get. I work in a store that carries games, and have been able to bring this in exactly once--and have never been able to get the Oceania expansion at all!

Still, it's nice to see a game with wildlife that is more about learning/exploration than capturing or killing (I would love a similar fish-based one, but most that exist are all about fishing instead of fish...although I haven't played Oceanos)