Board Game Spotlight: Wingspan

Board Game Spotlight where we take a brief look at games that have come across our table. Today we're taking a look at Wingspan from Stonemaier Games.

Wingspan from Stonemaier Games

Players: 1-5
Playing Time: 40-70 min
Age: 10+
Designer: Elizabeth Hargrave
Artists: Ana Maria Martinez Jaramillo, Natalia Rojas, Beth Sobel

Wingspan is a beautiful game where players will acquire resources and bird cards to play into their habitat preserve. It is an engine-building hand management game. The goal of the game is to have the most points at the end. Players gain points through the game by playing birds down, activating different abilities of birds, collecting eggs, and points gained from the end of the round effects.
In wingspan, players begin with a number of cards in their hands and some resources used to play the birds through the game. Three of the four-player actions are divided into habitats. The Forest habitat is where players can choose the gather food action. This allows players to gain food resources that come into play when playing birds. The prairie habitat is where players can play eggs on their birds. Eggs are worth points at the end of the game and are also used to play birds. The water habitat is where players draw new bird cards. The fourth action is playing a bird into one of 3 habitats. The cost to play a bird is the food they need and may include an egg cost. When a player plays a bird in one of the 3 habitat areas the next time the player uses the action in that habitat it changes based on what is printed on the game board, and what abilities the birds played down have.
Besides the point value, each bird has it’s own abilities. Some abilities trigger when you choose the action in their habitat. Some abilities may trigger when other players choose an action. Some abilities may trigger at the end of the round. Some abilities may trigger at the end of the game.
A round of Wingspan ends when all players have used their action cubes. Players see if there are any end of round actions on birds they have played. They will then consult the end of the round board to see how many points they gain. Losing one of their cubes to the end of the round board.
Play continues across 4 rounds.

This game was a surprise to us. I first saw it pop up on the various board game Facebook groups I’m in. I thought it was just a silly simple game. I got to play it and had a really good time with it. It has some educational elements to it as all the bird cards have the scientific name of the bird printed on the cards along with the region the birds are from on the very bottom of each card. The game is simple enough to pick up and has a lot of strategies depending on what direction your bonus cards give you.
The artwork on this one is fantastic. Each bird has a lifelike appearance. So far the dice tower bird feeder has withstood many games. The wooden dice are a nice change from normal dice. The eggs are thick plastic which is nice. They have a flat spot on them so they won’t roll all over the table.

There is one expansion for this one available that brings European birds to the game.

More information on wingspan can be found here
Stonemaier Games - https://stonemaiergames.com/games/wingspan/
Board Game Geek - https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/266192/wingspan

Who am I?
Joe DeMarco a single father, freelance writer, game designer, quality assurance software tester, and business analyst. I am a big-time gamer, and really enjoy checking out all kinds of games available. Putting my curiosity to the app store I find random games to check out.
If you have a game you'd like me to review, contact me and let us see how we can work together.