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Bug board game Insectarium could do for insects, what Wingspan did for birds

One to be buzzing over.

Artwork for Insectarium.
Image credit: Snowbright Studio

A new board game featuring a bug-based theme could do for insects what Wingspan did for birds.

Insectarium is an upcoming board game that sees players creating their own board of insect species to display within the display hall of the grand Insectarium, or a zoo that features a collection of insects. Similarly to 2019’s Wingspan, Insectarium features various illustrations of the natural world - in this case, of specimens that players have gathered during their bug-hunts - created by artist Meg Lemieur, who has previously illustrated for Defenders of the Wild and Corvids.

To create their insect displays, players will gather and utilise their gear, as well as collect the tools they need to arrange and pin the specimens they collect onto their displays. On a player’s turn, they must choose a card and a token from the shared pool, before selecting an insect specimen to pin to their board. Players can use their gear tokens to activate certain abilities that will help them with their displays.

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The more carefully considered the arrangement of specimens the better, as players will be able to gain bonuses as well as score based on certain categories. Whichever player has the most points by the end of the game is named the winner.

Insectarium was designed by Kristen Mott, a designer who has previously created other board games themed around cataloguing aspects of the natural world, such as Dinosaur Exhibit, Sharks and Clownfish Cove.

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Insectarium will be published by Snowbright Studios, a company who’s previously titles include Birds of a Feather: Western North America - a board game about bird watching along the North American western coast - and Harvest Hoppers, a board game about racing to deliver fresh vegetables to the citizens of a fictional town. This new board game from Snowbright will be produced under the company’s co-production program, which reportedly grants a 50/50 revenue split between the studio and Insectarium’s creator.

A crowdfunding campaign for Insectarium will be launched on Kickstarter sometime this year.

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Alex Meehan avatar
Alex Meehan: After writing for Kotaku UK, Waypoint and Official Xbox Magazine, Alex became a member of the Dicebreaker editorial family. Having been producing news, features, previews and opinion pieces for Dicebreaker for the past three years, Alex has had plenty of opportunity to indulge in her love of meaty strategy board games and gothic RPGS. Besides writing, Alex appears in Dicebreaker’s D&D actual play series Storybreakers and haunts the occasional stream on the Dicebreaker YouTube channel.
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