Learn Ark Nova

Welcome to your zoo

You plan and build a modern zoo: enclosures shaped to each animal’s needs, sponsors and partner zoos around the world, and conservation projects that protect species in the wild.

Two tracks decide the game:

• Appeal — how attractive your zoo is. Animals raise it; it pays your income.
• Conservation points — from supporting projects. The track runs the other way.

When your two counters meet, the end is near. The zoo whose appeal has passed its conservation counter furthest wins.

1–4 players (solo with its own rules), 90–150 minutes. Ready? Open the setup checklist — it adapts to your player count.

The boards

• Your zoo map: hexes to build on (not on rock or water), the 7 player tokens on the left that you move onto conservation projects, partner zoos and universities on the right, and 5 Action card slots along the bottom.
• The game board: the Appeal and Conservation tracks, the Reputation track , the display of 6 cards and the Break track.
• The Association board: tasks for your association workers and the conservation projects above and below it.

One action per turn

On your turn you use one Action card. Its slot number, 1 to 5, is its strength :

• Cards — draw or snap Zoo cards.
• Build — enclosures , kiosks , pavilions .
• Animals — play animals into empty enclosures: pay, place, gain appeal .
• Association — a worker takes reputation, a partner zoo , a university or supports a project.
• Sponsors — play a Sponsor card, or take money.

Then the card goes to slot 1 and the others slide right: what you just did is now weak. Or skip all that and take an X-token (+1 strength later).

Breaks and upgrades

Many actions push the Break token. When it reaches the end, there is a break after that turn:

1. Discard to 3 cards.
2. Workers come home.
3. The 2 oldest display cards leave.
4. Everyone takes income : money for appeal, kiosks and sponsors.

Four times in the game you may upgrade an Action card to side II — at 2 conservation points, on the Reputation track, and with a second partner zoo or university. Choose well: there are five cards.

Meeting in the middle

Conservation points come from projects : have enough of an icon (, , …) or release an animal into the wild. Donations and Final Scoring cards add more.

When your appeal and conservation counters reach the same scoring area at the end of your turn, everyone else gets one last turn. Then: appeal minus the lowest appeal of your conservation area is your score. Highest wins.

Read Teach the Game to explain it at the table.