Forget Angry Birds, protect Asian birds: New Singapore board game funded by Kickstarter supports an 'urgent' cause

• A team from Tuber, a Singapore editorial and design consultancy, created a board game about migratory birds
• The game was made in partnership with non-profit organisation Birdlife International Asia, which does bird conservation work
• It is funded on Kickstarter and donors will be first to get the game
• Part of the proceeds will go towards Birdlife International Asia's conservation efforts

SINGAPORE — Sparked by weekly board-game sessions and an interest in bird conservation, five employees from Tuber, a Singapore editorial and design consultancy, decided to create and design a board game of their own. 

The five team members are mostly Singaporeans in their 20s and 30s. Two others, a media consultant and an intern, are also part of the group.

They named the game Fly-A-Way, which is about bird migration, and are producing it in partnership with non-profit organisation Birdlife International Asia, which organises and supports conservation programmes for birds and nature with partners here and overseas.

In Fly-A-Way, players are bird conservationists who place links on the East Asian-Australasian flyway, one of the world’s major migratory routes, which stretches from the northern peninsula of Russia all the way south to Australia and New Zealand. 

Along the way, players draw cards that help them on their journey — such as those that indicate forest or wetland restoration — or that lead to dangerous encounters, such as wind turbine collisions and even mass extinction.

The game features 42 different birds — almost half of which can be found in Singapore, such as the oriental dwarf kingfisher, which travels from Myanmar to Sumatra, and fairy pitta, which travels from Taiwan to east Malaysia. 

Dr Yong Ding Li, flyways coordinator at Birdlife International Asia, who helped the team with research about migratory birds, believes that it is the first game to represent Asian birds.

“It features these birds at the continental scale, in part because migratory birds move across the continent when they migrate.

“They basically connect ecosystems that are very large-scale.

“It shows that Singapore is not an island per se (but is connected as part of an ecosystem). You have birds coming here from as far as Russia or Northern China.”

Dr Yong pointed out that migratory birds are very good indicators of the state of the environment.

“Because migratory birds depend on the wetlands, if their numbers are declining, then wetlands are not healthy, and that means that there could be repercussions on human beings.”

Ms Quek Oon Hong, creative director at Tuber, said that migratory birds are messengers of climate change when seen along these lines. 

Dr Yong added: “People cannot talk about the conservation of migratory birds if they do not even know what migratory birds do, or what migratory birds are suffering from. The game offers people a very innovative way of learning.”

The conservation efforts that players can take as they play the game will hopefully translate to action in real life. The Funds for Conservation card, for example, explains the importance of public support for conservation. 

The making of the game is funded via Kickstarter, an online crowdfunding channel. After it was launched on Nov 23, it reached its funding goal of S$10,000 in 22 hours. 

Funding will continue until Dec 14 and the game will be shipped by June next year to Kickstarter donors who are backing the project.

For now, those who do not want to donate through Kickstarter will have to wait. The team intends to use the campaign to gauge retailer interest and distribute to their backers first, before sharing more about other channels of distribution.

A SPIN-OFF FROM WORK

The project had its beginnings in 2018, when the Tuber team worked on a brochure for Birdlife International Asia. During the process, they became interested in migratory birds and wanted to do something to raise awareness for the cause.

The idea to create a game was planted in March last year and since then, the team has been developing, prototyping and refining the product.  

Ms Quek of Tuber said: “This is a fun way of doing it, instead of doing a video or brochure that the market already has.”

Mr Simon Vincent, content strategist at Tuber, said: “Board games are a wonderfully experiential medium.”

To make a niche topic such as bird conservation relatable to players, the team tapped the storytelling aspect of board games.

“We found the board game to be the perfect immersive medium to map out the drama of bird migration and invoke the urgency of bird conservation,” Ms Quek said. 

The team also focused on visuals. “You look at the art of a card, maybe it’s a fantasy thing, and what draws you to it is that you are seeing something captivating,” Mr Vincent said. “And you can do the same thing with birds.” 

The team also focused on storytelling and drama to create an exciting experience for players. 

The game has been tested with friends, family, environmentalists and board-gamers here and overseas. 

“We work with many board-gamers. We got their feedback and they’ve been great,” Mr Vincent said, adding that the feedback has been good and players find the game challenging.

The team is in talks with nature groups, such as Little Green Men Singapore, to use the game as an outreach tool. 

Part of the proceeds from Kickstarter will go to Birdlife International Asia’s conservation efforts in the region, such as conducting patrols in protected areas for birds and organising meetings for rural communities to explain how natural resources can be used sustainably.