I am an animal nut. While I could do without snakes and some bugs, the rest get the full measure of my affection. It helps if they are cute, but they don’t even really have to be. I mean, pangolins are weird-looking, but still lovable in my book.

When I learned there was a board game giving you the chance to help all those wonderful creatures adapt to a changing ecosystem, giving them a better chance at survival, I was all in. That majestic-looking snow leopard on the cover didn’t hurt either. She’s beautiful, and that cute little cub behind her is worth my best effort at survival adaptations. I wanted to play this game. Badly. I prefer to try games out before I buy them, though.

Alas, all my usual venues for game testing were distressingly Nature-free. Which left me sadder than a hungry snow leopard (although nowhere near as cute). Then those brilliant minds over at North Star Games released a digital version. And because they are really smart, they asked Board Game Quest if we were interested. North Star Games knows the way to my heart, snow leopards and free games!

Gameplay Overview:

I played the Steam version, which appears to be a faithful representation of the physical board game. Each game is four rounds. You set up around a watering hole. Each round has several phases: food distribution into the watering hole (based on a randomly drawn card), then trait assignments. Five randomly drawn trait cards are available to be assigned to your species. Every species starts as an herbivore with three spots to add traits. To create a carnivore, add the hunter trait. Other traits can help protect your species from hunters, increase food requirements, or allow scavenging. Trait cards can also be spent to increase species population or size.

Game start options. Between AI difficulty and the various expansions, there’s the possibility for a lot of variety.

Once players are satisfied with the assigned traits, it’s time to feed the animals. Food is foraged from the watering hole (unassigned trait cards can add food) or hunted by attacking your opponent’s species. In a pinch, you can hunt your own species to keep from starving. Survival of the fittest and all that.

Next round adds an additional species. Draw another five cards and repeat all actions. After round four, points are scored based on the number of species that have survived and the total number of plants and meat eaten.

Nature has several expansions. Four are available in the digital game. Three expansions add animal types and new traits. Jurassic is focused on dinosaurs, both the showy predators and the little prey species that rely on hiding. Flight adds the ability to fly, nest, and flock. Tundra includes traits for hibernating, adding fat, and foraging outside the watering hole. The final expansion does not add animal traits, but instead has natural disasters which effect populations. Tundra and Flight have added rules to introduce some additional complexity but the overall gameplay is largely the same.

The ‘Boss Battles’ create a pretty crowded board. This is the start of the first round, with my available traits ready to be assigned.

Game Experience:

This was a rough review to write. Mostly because I think I really like Nature. I found it difficult to learn digitally, though. I played through the tutorial several times and learned the basics: play cards, feed your species. The campaign adds opponents with specific strategies (fertility or glutton) once you’ve got the basics. Then, boss battles with multiple opponents to really see how you do. Generally, I love that kind of ramping up. But the lack of clear instructions made it hard for me to really figure out how best to defeat the AI opponents.

The Jurassic expansion adds some new traits, and a thematic color scheme to the player board.

The best part of digital games is that they take care of all scorekeeping and setup. In this case, though not knowing where I was earning points kept me from really learning the game. Eventually, I found the printed rules for the board game and read through those. This helped immensely. Once I had a better handle on the rules, I could figure out my strategy.

Good thing too, there’s a definite strategy needed in this game. One campaign game sees you working with limited food resources. Having at least one hunter and all my foragers with the scavenger trait helped. Until I couldn’t hunt anymore. I wasn’t certain why until I read in the more detailed rules about defense values, which combine physical size and defense trait values. The digital game rules never tell you about this, so I was left wondering what happened.

I can’t resist assigning the Thagomizer every time it comes up. Not just a great joke, but a really powerful trait too.

Of the expansions, I think I like the Jurassic one the best. Not because I have a dinosaur fixation, but because this one is really just Nature with different traits. It leans into the hunters, and apparently, I really like creating hunters. Flight and Tundra have added complications that are not explained at all in the brief tutorial. Three games into Flight, and I have no idea what’s up with the eggs?

There are two modes of play: a campaign and a normal game with varying levels of difficulty for your AI opponent. In the normal game, you can mix and match which expansions you want to include. These combos, combined with the levels of AI difficulty, mean that you can get a lot of variation in this game.

Final Thoughts:

The best thing about digital implementations is that you get the chance to play some of your favorite games when your regular gaming partners aren’t available. If you love Nature, you will love Nature digital. It is a true digital representation of the board game and contains nearly all the available expansions.

If you want to know if you love Nature, play the board game first. The digital version seems to have been designed for players who already know the game well.

Final Score: 3 Stars – was going to be a 2.5, but I got the Thagomizer joke (Go here in case you didn’t)

Hits:
• Good adaptation
• Very nice artwork
• Good variety

Misses:
• Bad instructions
• No explanation for some expansion features
• Did I mention bad instructions?