Tideward by Connie Vogelmann will be released by Avalon Hill in January 2027, and Essen attendees will be among the first to demo the game onsite.
Avalon Hill has revealed Tideward, the newest game from designer Connie Vogelmann, where players help guide baby sea turtles to safety. Each year, thousands of baby sea turtles take their first steps toward the tide – a journey brimming with wonder, but also danger! Now, that incredible journey from sand to sea can be experienced by players in a new tabletop adventure.
“We’re down here in Tortuguero, Costa Rica, with the Sea Turtle Conservancy,” Game Designer Connie Vogelman says on Instagram. “Grounding the game in a real place has been absolutely fantastic. Specific predators, specific food sources. We’ve been working with the sea turtle conservancy, who have been showing us all kinds of amazing things about sea turtles – about how they hatch, about how the eggs are laid.”
Tortuguero has the largest green sea turtle rookery in the Western Hemisphere and the Sea Turtle Conservancy has fact-checked the game.
“Seeing the mama sea turtles laboriously come up onto the beach, dig a giant hole, actually lay their eggs, and then – absolutely exhausted – make their way back to the sea,” Connie continues. “We’ve gotten to see the baby sea turtles running with all their might toward this giant wave. I mean, you just have to realise how incredible the natural world is in ways that we don’t ever see, and Tideward is a game all about that.”
Tideward is a game for ages 10 and up, with four ways to play, depending on which Algal Mat you select. Players can take three actions in any combination: hatch eggs, gain food or move one of their hatchlings toward the algae.
Players guide baby green sea turtles on their big journey from the sand to the open water and out to the safety of the algal mats. Beware of the ghost crabs that lurk on the beach, or your hopeful hatchlings will perish.
The game ends when one player gets all their hatchlings to the water, and players score their points from their Tide Quest card and how they arrange their turtles on the Algal Mat. The player with the highest score wins. Tideward hits local game stores in January 2027 but those attending Spiel Essen can swing by Hall 7, Stand 7E211 to be one of the first to play Tideward.