Fish and Ships

Fish n’ Ships is a multiplayer card game about marine conservation: fish in a sustainable way in your sea in order to obtain more points than the other players for cards in the sea and cards of caught species. The game reproduces the Adriatic and Mediterranean marine food web and fisheries complexity. There are 36 different species divided into 4 groups based on their position in the food chain (Trophic level): producers (green cards), primary consumers (yellow cards), secondary consumers (orange cards) , tertiary consumers (red cards). In the first phase of the game the players have to “build” their marine ecosystem, in which there must be organisms from all trophic levels. A player with a healthy sea (i.e. with at least one red card) can start the second phase of the game: use the fishing cards to fish in the player’s own sea. Every player starts having eight fishing cards, each one corresponding to a fishing technique commonly used in Adriatic Sea, with their target species and secondary effects on habitat. There are other cards related to human activities or natural events that may affect the game (bonus, malus). Points are assigned based on the healthy status of the player’s sea and on how he fished in a sustainable way.

The game is part of the Interreg project FAIRSEA (Fisheries in the AdriatIc Region - a Shared Ecosystem Approach), which objective is to enhance the conditions for implementing innovative approaches in the sector of sustainable fisheries management in the Adriatic Sea.

—description from the designer