Waddle Waddle: You are the (penguin) hero!
Nature photographer turned creator Darren Humphrey on the Gamefound campaign for his Antarctica-set board game
It’s International Penguin Day this week! Who knew? Not, the penguins, that’s for sure.
But now that you do know all about April 25, let’s add to the Antarctic-based aquatic bird-related news: Flightless-wonder themed board game Waddle Waddle gets its Gamefound campaign launch to mark the occasion.
We spoke to designer Darren Humphrey of Brush-Tail Games about the area-control, South Pole-themed title, filled with penguin facts in which players play the role of a famed eco-campaigner.
Can you tell us a little about yourself and the genesis of Waddle Waddle?
DH: Before retiring and becoming a bit of a wanderer, I co-founded a tech company that was very successful. Our software was predominantly used in the flight simulation business. We worked with Nasa and most of the top-tier aerospace companies in the US, Europe and Asia.
Part of that job included taking highly detailed photos of aircraft cockpits and other expensive things, and that put very high quality digital camera gear in my hands. Sometimes I got to borrow that gear and that led to my hobby of photographing wildlife.
In December 2022, after photographing penguins on the Antarctic peninsula, we were visiting Stanley, the capital of the Falkland Islands, which is loaded with gift shops that sell every imaginable penguin souvenir.
I’m also an avid tabletop gamer and I noticed that there weren’t any penguin board games. And that gave me the idea that there should be one. And I just happened to have a lot of penguin photos.
What type of board game is this – can you tell us about its mechanics, themes and aims?
DH: Waddle Waddle features set collection, area control, open drafting and push-your-luck. There are 72 Penguin cards, each with a unique penguin fact and a photo of a penguin taken by me or my friends Craig and Lauren, who also travelled to the Antarctic.
Essentially, Waddle Waddle has six suits of 12 cards each, for the six species of penguins in the game: chinstrap, gentoo, king, macaroni, Magellanic and southern rockhopper. There’s also a special Penguin card called Kevin, based on a real penguin that’s different – he is leucistic.
The idea is you play as one of the six penguin heroes in the game to collect sets of penguins called waddles. Each hero is based on a real-life person and each one has a unique in-game ability.
Bigger waddles get more points. Waddles are collected similar to the card game Rummy – numeric runs, all the same species or all the same numeric value.
Each two penguins of the same species in your waddle puts a nest on the board. You get bonus points at the end of each Season for having the most nests at each penguin Rookery.
There are also several Threats to penguins randomly placed in the deck. Each threat has a corresponding effect token that goes on the board and affects one location for the remainder of the Season.
Each season ends after finding four threats in the penguin deck. Then points are collected for having the most nests.
A quick game is one season. A long game is three seasons. Nests remain on the board after a season ends. Each season has a set of random season events that change the rules or starting conditions for that season.
The overall aim of the game is to educate players about different species of penguins, where they live, and to highlight some of the people and organisations that conserve penguins.
Who have you worked with and gained support from to get the game into this position?
DH: For development of the game itself, I’ve been supported by my friend Lawrence Collins, another avid gamer and collector of board games. He’s given me many good ideas and been a sounding board for ideas.
For artwork, the game board was developed by Ron Halliday. Ron is a professional cartographer by day and game designer by night. He’s created the board layout using real-world imagery and professional cartography software, which means the Waddle Waddle map is an accurate view of the southern hemisphere.
The Waddle Waddle cover was commissioned from Natalia Rojas. She’s perhaps best known for her illustration of a scissor-tailed flycatcher that’s on the cover of the Wingspan box. Natalia’s cover image for Waddle Waddle was hand-drawn in coloured pencil and then composited with an abstract watercolour background she created.
And for penguin photos, Lauren Poore gave me access to thousands of high-quality penguin photos that she and her late husband, Craig, took in the Antarctic region.
Wingspan was an unlikely nature-themed hit – what is it about nature-related board games that people are connecting with?
DH: My gut feeling is that the popularity of Wingspan is a reflection of the expansion of tabletop gaming outside the classic core market of fantasy and science fiction fans.
There are a lot of birding fans in the world, and birding is a very detailed-oriented, analytical task, skills that align with tabletop gaming. Plus, birds are fascinating and beautiful, and Stomemaier hired very talented artists to draw the illustrations.
How did you pick the real-life penguin heroes for the game and do they have any unique attributes in-game?
DH: The Indianapolis Zoo Foundation gives out an annual prize for animal conservation called the Indianapolis Prize. It’s considered to be the top prize in the world for animal conservation. The 2023 winner of the prize was Dr Pablo Borboroglu. And Dr Dee Boersma has been a finalist three times.
I learned about them when I visited the Indy zoo during GenCon 2023. They seemed perfect candidates to be penguin heroes.
About the same time, I learned about Dyan deNapoli, The Penguin Lady, while researching penguin conservationists. I reached out to Dyan about being in Waddle Waddle and she was very interested and wanted to know who else would be in the game.
So I asked her to write a list of top penguin conservationists she thought should be in the game. Not surprisingly, her top two picks were Dee and Pablo. She also recommended Dr Heather Lynch, Dr Lloyd Davis and strongly recommended that I reach out to SANCCOB [Southern African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds].
Dyan was also instrumental in bringing them on board. These were all people she knew in real life, and so she helped introduce me to them.
You’ve travelled all over the world and photographed animals in several countries. What is it about penguins that made you want them to be the focus for this game?
My primary motivation for penguins was a combination of the fact that they are hugely popular with people in general, yet under-represented in tabletop games. And the premise of penguins surviving in the wild and scientists studying them seemed like such an organic theme for a game.
I also felt that it was a really natural fit to be a product in a gift shop setting. When people experience seeing penguins in person, they always want the same thing afterwards – to take that experience home with them.
And my experience demoing Waddle Waddle bears that premise out. When I meet people who love both penguins and board games, they just run up to the table and scream “penguins!” The vast majority of people who play a demo have signed up to back on Gamefound.
Do you have a favourite penguin?
The company name, Brush-Tail Games, is based on a genus of penguins called brush-tailed penguins, which includes adelie, chinstrap and gentoo. I like chinstraps. Coincidentally, the company logo is a chinstrap. But I love them all.
‘The vision is for Waddle Waddle to be an evergreen game that is sold for many years at zoos, aquariums, theme parks and other nature-related venues that have a live penguin exhibit’
Aside from the penguins, what other animals have been a joy to photograph? Any particular favourites?
Probably the most enjoyable experience was photographing in the Galápagos Islands because there’s no fear of predators there. Being able to get six feet away from the animals makes for some great photos. We even got to snorkel where some Galapagos penguins were.
But I also love game driving in Tanzania for the sheer variety and amount of wildlife. Seeing a million wildebeest during birthing season in Ndutu is unbelievable.
Obviously there’s an ecological theme to the game. Which sustainability measures have you taken for the game?
Thank you for asking! I’ve worked extensively with my manufacturer to eliminate all plastic elements from Waddle Waddle. Instead of plastic baggies, you get cloth bags for components. All tokens are FSC-certified wood. There’s no shrink wrap on the box and a tuck box is provided for the cards. The insert is cardboard instead of blow-molded plastic.
Everything is printed on recycled paper stocks and no plastic-based coatings are added to the cards, which would otherwise render them non-recyclable at the end of their lives.
But perhaps more importantly, each copy of Waddle Waddle sold includes a $1 (80p) donation to the Global Penguin Society and a further $1 to SANCCOB. Both of these organisations have the same mission – to conserve penguins.
When does the Gamefound campaign begin and end?
The gamefound campaign launches April 25 – World Penguin Day – and runs for three weeks.
What are your favourite games to play with family members?
For nature-themed, we love Cascadia. Lately we’ve been playing a lot of Daybreak. It’s my favourite Matt Leacock game, has a solid ecological theme and, as usual for his games, is a tough win.
We also often play 7 Wonders and Ticket to Ride.
We gravitate towards games that have quick player turns and can handle more than four players. Those were definitely drivers in the design of Waddle Waddle.
What can we expect from Brush-Tail Games in the future. Any further projects in the pipeline?
The vision is for Waddle Waddle to be an evergreen game that is sold for many years at zoos, aquariums, theme parks and other nature-related venues that have a live penguin exhibit. If Waddle Waddle is a success, I plan to develop more penguin-themed games that feature educational content.
Waddle Waddle is sort of the 10,000-foot view of penguins, featuring six penguin species in broad strokes. I see the potential for games that focus on specific species or habitats, such as the little penguins in Australia, African penguins in South Africa, or the Galapagos Penguins. In particular, our penguin hero Dyan deNapoli wrote a book about the Great Penguin Rescue of 2000 where 40,000 penguins were rescued from an oil spill, which I think would make a fantastic theme for a co-op game.
For more information, visit Waddle Waddle’s Gamefound page or go to brushtailgames.com.
Review round-up
This week, me and the kid have mostly been playing…
Raleigh Burner BMX Game
Heart-stopping action is not to be found in this retro tabletop adaptation, but there are thrills of a more mundane nature.
Read the full review
Pitch & Plakks
Modular miniature golf, complete with bridges and volcanoes.
Elsewhere on the web
Other tabletop game stories we liked this week:
On similar theme to our own thoughts on the launch of Scrabble Together, Dan Kois played the game for Slate.
Scott Travers writes for Forbes about Catan’s new sustainability twist.