Mariposas The Board Game: A Review
Mariposas is a beautiful board game about the migration of monarch butterflies from Mexico into North America. Players must breed their butterflies, score objectives and then make it back south again before the game ends.
Mariposas: Quick Summary
Score:
7.5/10
Number of Players:
1-4
Time to Play:
60 minutes
A nice easy game to learn for beginners, and very pretty too - but it lacks the depth of other worker placement games
What we loved:
The high quality of the design, the butterflies and the board
Once understood, the game is easy to play
There is some tactical nuance required
Great for the whole family
A lovely way to learn about Monarch butterflies
What could be improved:
The instructions aren't the best, and require a re-reading
There isn't much depth to the game
It's not the sort of game that will end up in a day of replaying
What is the board game Mariposas about?
Mariposas is a board game for 1-4 people, suitable for most age groups. You are a colony of Monarch butterflies migrating from Mexico into the USA, breeding and eating along the way, before heading back south again for the winter. This game was designed by Elizabeth Hargrave, who was responsible for a large part of Wingspan, the titanically successful bird-based gateway game.
Monarch butterflies are the large, beautiful orange butterflies that migrate in their millions twice a year. In California, you can often see them in their hundreds hanging from trees. The objective of this game is to successfully reach key towns in North America, taking actions per turn and collecting special cards to complete sets and gain points.
The premise is straightforward to understand and engage with. It has the right ethos behind it, too, promoting the conservation and awareness of these amazing insects. It is fun, the kind of game that is lovely to play once every now and again, a nice palate cleanser between other more replayable games.
How to play Mariposas
Gameplay is simple and easy; players each turn must draw two cards that each have a butterfly and directional arrows. These movement cards will show either one or two butterflies and the player must choose which card to play and where to move butterflies across four coloured zones. There are special markers on certain towns that unlock additional cards which can be collected to make a set and score points at the end of the game.
Players play objective cards for each season at the beginning of the game. Objectives will require players to move butterflies into particular coloured zones, near certain food plants or north, south, east or west of a town. Once a player achieves this objective, they score points. The seasons move on from spring to winter across four rounds, and in each season, generations of butterflies are removed. This means players need to keep their eye on multiplying their butterflies through the generations, as in the fourth round, high points are scored for each fourth generation butterfly back in the original starting square at the bottom of the map.
The way Mariposas scores points will require players to balance moving their butterflies, collecting food plants, visiting towns and unlocking special card tokens. If they stray too far north then the player won't have time to pull butterflies back down the map quick enough to score the big final round points. If they stay too far south, then the objectives will be harder to achieve and points will be lost.
The movement cards add a random element to Mariposas, there is nearly the right amount of variety in the different types of card, with some showing lots of movement for one butterfly or smaller distances for two. The player can therefore plan their strategy, but needs to adapt as the cards they draw help or hinder their planning.
Overall relatively simple, once players know how to play or have a few games under their wing (pun intended), they can then rapidly wizz through a game in around 30 minutes.
The pros and cons in detail
Is Mariposas a quality game?
We loved the design and finish levels of the pieces and cards in Mariposas. The board has a quality satin finish to it, the colours are rich and well chosen and the butterfly pieces are really smartly finished. The cards have a premium textured feel and they are clear and easy to understand without large swathes of text everywhere. The food counters are OK, they are card and probably the lowest quality of finish in the game other than the instructions. Everything else feels like it was designed for an expensive game from the box itself right through to the texture of the playing board and the cards. This isn't a deluxe version and yet the quality is. We also liked the fact that all the playing pieces are wooden or card, not only is this more sustainable, but in the case of the butterflies feel really good in your hand.
Is Mariposas an easy game to play?
Once you understand the way the rules are explained (more on that below) and you've played through once, you will find it easy to pick up and play without too much of a refresher. This is something that can actually be hard to find in board games, with the nuances and complexities meaning that if you take a break from a game for a reasonable period of time it feels like you're starting all over again when you pick it up. Something Elizabeth Hargraves is good at finding are board game mechanics that feel intuitive and so are easy to remember. This could reasonably be played by the whole family, with the right mix of design, playability and pace to keep most attention spans entertained.
How tactical is Mariposas?
Mariposas has a limited level of tactical nous, you won't find depth here like you would in Brass: Birmingham or Food Chain Magnate, but that's actually a good thing because this is designed to be a fun, light afternoon session for 45 minutes or so rather than an all-day brain train. There is also limited interplay, but it doesn't feel like two parallel solo experiences, like Railroad Inc for instance, there are moments where you can steal spaces, use other player moves to enhance your own or race first to achieve objectives. It is competitive, but not angrily so and there are plenty of moments where you can play through gently and just enjoy the flight of your butterflies north and then back down again. This isn't a strategic heavyweight, but deep enough to keep you thinking.
The Mariposas Instructions Booklet
The one area we found bafflingly weak was the instruction booklet. Overall it looks good, isn't too wordy and has lots of visuals, so from an accessibility point of view is very good. However when it came to play the game we kept finding gaps where the booklet just didn't quite nail the precise way a mechanic should work. For instance, collecting bonus cards, it was ambiguous on how they worked, how they were collected and what their impact was for the game. We needed three or four playthroughs until we were certain we had got the hang of them, and even then I think we may have inadvertently house-ruled it. For a game so simple once you know how to play, the instructions needed just a little bit more time and care. Still this is being picky when everything else was such high quality.
Mariposas Depth and Replayability
Mariposas is just deep enough for a game every now and again on a wet Saturday in Autumn or Winter. It's fun to play through once, maybe twice if you really love it, but then it will go back in the cupboard while you binge through fifty games of something really replayable like Wingspan, Finspan, Ganz Schon Clever or Paper Dungeons. It's the sorbet in between the tasting menu of real heavy hitters during a board gaming session.
That said, it still has longevity, this isn't a game we will part with in a hurry. This isn't Champions of the Wild, which flattered to deceive, it's a pure, lovely game that isn't something that feels bingeable. So you might still be playing it every two months in ten year's time.
Mariposas: A Summary
Overall a lovely game that's easy to pick up and play without diving too deep into the instructions every time. Good for the whole family, with a wholesome theme that educates without preaching, but with little inter-player interaction during play. Mariposas has a premium quality finish on everything with the exception of the final touches on the instructions. You'll play this regularly throughout the year, but you won't binge on it like you might with other, deeper games.
Expansions and Related Games
Expansions
Currently there are no expansions for Mariposas
Related Games
Board games and nature have been walking hand in hand for a few years now, biodiversity and conservation is well represented in board game design. Check out Finspan, Fungi the Board Game or Whale to Look if you enjoy games involving wildlife. We also have a guide on nature board games!
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Mariposas: Frequently Asked Questions
Is Mariposas a good game for non-gamers or casual players?
Mariposas is an excellent option to introduce new players and a solid gateway game. It's not as compulsive as Wingspan, but is easy to understand, pretty and competitive around a wholesome theme. These combined make it a great starter game.
How easy is Mariposas to teach to new players?
This should be a quick teach, and actually is probably easier to teach than to run through the instructions. The mechanics are light enough to grasp quickly, and intuitive enough that even new players can work out what each action or process delivers. It's a good game for a mix of regular board gamers and newbies alike.
Does Mariposas work well with different player counts
This is a game that works well with two players, but benefits from having three or four players fluttering across the board. The game is graded based on how many players are involved, with additional objectives and markers being added, but there is more interactivity with more than two players as there are more chances to steal food, spaces or cards.
That said, two player is solid and the most common way we play Mariposas.
Transparency Notice
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