It’s clear from her designs that Elizabeth Hargrave has a fondness for nature. Wingspan, Tussie-Mussie, Mariposas and upcoming release The Fox Experiment are all immersed in the natural world.
Following on from this, Hargrave has announced her newest game, Undergrove, will be heading onto Kickstarter in October. It’s a game that Hargrave has called her “trees and mushrooms game” and Hargrave has shared photos of the prototype version on her Twitter feed. She’s once again collaborating with the remarkable artistic talents of Beth Sobel, so it will certainly be a gorgeous looking production.
In its description on Board Game Geek, Undergrove is described as a medium-weight game which explores the relationships between Douglas-firs and fungi, and the player who creates the most valuable symbiotic relationships wins the game (though I secretly hope whoever wins is referred to as the “champignon” rather than the winner because who doesn’t love puns?)
Further to the announcement, Hargrave also declared herself nervous about the release because of the increased number of mushroom themed games hitting retail before or around the same time in the next few months. She admitted to having similar feelings about Wingspan and the increasing number of bird-themed games at the time, but look at how well that has done!
I’m certainly looking forward to seeing more of what Elizabeth Hargrave brings with Undergrove as October approaches. The theme sounds interesting and medium-weight games are certainly a sweet spot of mine. Knowing that she’s teaming up with Sobel, who is also responsible for the artwork on games like Cascadia, Calico and The Whatnot Cabinet is just the cherry on top.
