Animals

Description from BoardgameNews.com:

Army of Frogs is for 2-4 players and resembles Hive in that the gameboard is created while you play. The goal of the game is to create one large group of frogs—an army, if you will—through tactical manoeuvring and placement of the pieces, which are hexagonal Bakelite frogs. Each player starts with two randomly drawn frogs, and on a turn a player takes the following three actions to build and shift an island of frogs in the center of the table:

if possible, move a frog of his color that’s on the board to a new location (something that’s obviously skipped on the first turn)
add one of the frogs in his supply to the board, and
draw a new frog from the bag and add it to his supply.

The first player to link all their frogs (with at least seven in play) wins the game.

From the Publisher:

Hive is a highly addictive strategic game for two players that is not restricted by a board and can be played anywhere on any flat surface. Hive is made up of twenty two pieces, eleven black and eleven white, resembling a variety of creatures each with a unique way of moving.

With no setting up to do, the game begins when the first piece is placed down. As the subsequent pieces are placed this forms a pattern that becomes the playing surface (the pieces themselves become the board). Unlike other such games, the pieces are never eliminated and not all have to be played. The object of the game is to totally surround your opponent's queen, while at the same time trying to block your opponent from doing likewise to your queen. The player to totally surround his opponent's queen wins the game.

Online Play

Boardspace.net (real-time, AI option)
BoardgameArena (real-time)

WILL YOU BE THE FINEST PIRATE?

As captain of a pirate crew, your ultimate goal is to find the most incredible treasure of all times: the Golden Pineapple. The map leading to it has been cut in parts long time ago, and hidden in different places of the Caribbean Sea. In order to win the game, you will have to face and overcome all the other pirates also searching the Golden Pineapple map. Play your cards wisely to find the treasure and become a pirate of legends!

RULE OVERVIEW

Piña Pirata is played in rounds. At each round, every player receives 8 cards. The goal is to be the first to get rid of all your cards.

At your turn, you must play one card, or draw one if you can’t. A card can be played if at least one of the pirates depicted on it is also on the top card of the play area. As soon as a player has no more card in her hand, she wins the round and gets a part of the treasure map. If a player has all 4 map parts, he wins the game!

The tricky part come from the Adventure tiles: At the beginning of the game, 2 tiles are revealed. Each of those Adventures is a new rule that will change the gameplay. There are 40 different tiles with a lot of different rules. Use them as their best to play more cards than you should or prevent the other players to play theirs!

At the end of each round, the winner chooses a new Adventure and adds it to the previous ones. The more the game is going, the more special effects are triggered for more and more fun!

In Hey, That's My Fish!, players want to catch as many fish as possible with their waddle of penguins. Each turn, a player moves one penguin in a straight line over hex-shaped ice tiles with 1, 2 or 3 fish on them. The player then collects the hex from where the penguin started its movement from the table, thereby creating a gap which penguins can't cross on future turns. When a penguin can't move, it's removed from play with its owner claiming the tile on which it stands. The player who collects the most fish wins.

The Hare and the Tortoise, originally published as Royal Turtle, is a card-driven betting game about animal racing loosely based on one of Aesop's Fables.

At the start of a race, each player secretly bets on one of five animals: turtle, rabbit, lamb, wolf and fox. One animal is chosen at random for each player, then after receiving a hand of seven cards, each player places one of his cards face-down (possibly the same animal) as an additional bet. Players then take turns laying down 1-4 cards, with all cards needing to show the same animal, then refilling the hand to five cards. As soon as eight total cards have been played or four cards of any one animal, the animals move (maybe).

Each animal has a distinct characteristic that players can use to their advantage. The turtle always moves one space, but it moves two if four of its cards were played. The rabbit always moves two spaces as long as cards are played. — unless four cards are played and it's at the head of the pack, in which case it sleeps and doesn't move. The fox moves as many spaces as the number of cards played. The lamb moves one more space than the number of cards played — but if it reaches water, it stops moving to take a drink. The wolf moves 1 space if one to two cards are played, and one less space than the number of cards if more are played. The wolf also has 3 cards with a howl, if one of these is played no one but the wolf moves.(The track consists of eleven road cards, two covered with water.)

After the animals move, players start a new round of card-playing. A round ends when three of the four animals reach the goal, after which each player scores points based on the ranking of the animals and how he bet. After three rounds, the player with the most points wins.

The original title of Royal Turtle is a homage to Reiner Knizia's Royal Turf, another betting game about animals racing (albeit horses in that game).