Wingspan was quite a discovery for me this year. I got this as a part of the gift from my family for my round, fortieth birthday and spent pretty decent amount of time familiarizing with the base game, then European Expansion and last but not least – quite interesting solo variant – AUTOMA. It was definitely a time well-spent.

Wingspan – first impressions – Base Game
Wingspan – first impressions – European Expansion
Wingspan – first impressions – AUTOMA
Wingspan - full review by The Boardgames Chronicle

The Game

Beautiful Wingspan component

Wingspan for me is a very elegant, repayable and interesting title. A competitive, medium-weight, card-driven, engine-building board game (wow, I pulled quite nice adjective rich description : ) You are one of the bird enthusiasts – researchers, bird watchers, ornithologists, and collectors – seeking to discover and attract the best birds to your network of wildlife preserves. Each bird extends a chain of powerful combinations in one of your habitats (actions). The winner is the player with the most points after 4 rounds. Sounds simple? Oh, believe me, it is not. The game is deep, interesting and thrilling.

Our bingie gaming

After couple of months without that game hitting the table – you really need sometimes a break, even from the pretty good titles – we decided with Magda, my wife, time has come to play again. We planned to test the game again thoroughly, using all possible end-of-round goals. That meant at least 6 sessions – which we played in 7 days, kind like movie bingie watching 🙂 

Bingie watching - the practice of watching multiple episodes of a television program in rapid succession, typically by means of DVDs or digital streaming.

Ok, so let us have a look int more details how it went. Below graphical summary, some comments to each game as well as table which I personally find pretty informative.

  • Game 1 - you can see we have not played for a long time; the results were pretty low and I pulled victory thanks to eggs (picture from Wingmate app)
    Game 1 – you can see we have not played for a long time; the results were pretty low and I pulled victory thanks to eggs (picture from Wingmate app)
  • Game 2 - that was a really great performance from my side, especially with bonus cards (20 VPs) although I lost in end-of-turn goals.
    Game 2 – that was a really great performance from my side, especially with bonus cards (20 VPs) although I lost in the end-of-turn goals.
  • Game 3 - first victory for Magda although I had almost 40 VPs from birds itself; but zero from bonuses at the same time.
    Game 3 – first victory for Magda although I had almost 40 VPs from birds itself; but zero from bonuses at the same time.
  • Game 4 - close game with average results, which I lost in birds category but catch-up gradually in other aspects.
    Game 4 – close game with average results, which I lost in birds category but catch-up gradually in other aspects.
  • Game 5 - our best game. Close, with high results and great play. The key to success for me were again bonus cards (20 VPs).
    Game 5 – our best game. Close, with high results and great play. The key to success for me were again bonus cards (20 VPs).
  • Game 6 - Magda pulled great victory in our last session, scoring 17 points for gregarious birds.
    Game 6 – Magda pulled great victory in our last session, scoring 17 points for gregarious birds.

Below the mentioned table with all the games:

#MichalMagda
Game 16557
Game 28063
Game 36073
Game 47468
Game 58476
Game 66878
Average~71~69

That was a really great experience. The more we played, the better we know what and how we wanted to perform. The results were pretty satisfactory – only once below 60, with averages oscillating around 70. The variety of end-turn-goals is rich, especially with European Expansion. The game is always fun, and I am always able to convince my wife to play it (which is a great advantage of that title!) On top of this, we were using very handy application – Wingmate. Pretty cool and useful app; great assistance in scoring or playing against Automa.

It was great time, well spent with family. I hope to enrich the experience with another expansion – Oceania! Stay tuned!