To flutter means to move back and forth rapidly but also delicately. It is the movement of butterflies, bees, hummingbirds, and other pollinators, who help grow and nurture a meadow. Phase Shift games won a mom’s choice award in 2023 for Flutter due to its family-friendly quality and value. It is a game about nurturing and growing a thriving meadow ecosystem dependent on the butterflies, bees, and other creatures referred to as “pollinators.” To accomplish this, flowers need to grow and thrive, which this colorful tile-laying game beautifully illustrates as players take part in bringing the ecosystem to life together. While they help build a lush and colorful meadow, they also compete to earn points for being the most valuable contributor to its success. The point currency in this game is pollen points, derived from flowers and spread by the pollinators!
Earn pollen in the process of building one common meadow made from tiles of 5 different shapes, which are all different sizes. There is a stack for each of these tile shapes, and players will gain one per turn to place in the meadow. These meadow tiles also have different combinations of red, blue, purple, or yellow petals along their edges. When a tile is placed that matches petal colors with a tile previously placed, players use their petal tokens—one in each color—to track their petals earned along a numbered track on their player boards. This track also shows how players will be awarded pollen for any petals that remain unused at the end of the game. When you place a meadow tile that completely encloses another tile, use petal credits on your player board to gain more pollen point tokens. If you create an empty space by encircling it with tiles, use enough lake tiles drawn from a separate lake tile supply to fill the space in. Each of these tiles has a reward of either petal credits on your player board or pollen tokens.
When the last tile in one of the meadow tile stacks is placed in the meadow, everyone takes their final turn and the game ends. Pollen counting then begins to find out the winner.
First, players gain pollen tokens for unused flower petals on their player board based on the pollen credit numbers printed on each of the spaces their 4 petal tokens are currently located. Add these pollen tokens to those collected during the game and whoever has the most pollen points wins!
Flutter is for 2-5 players with a 45-minute playtime. I personally believe that it plays best with 3 to 4 players due to having more variability in decision-making with tile placement and rondel selection that does not translate as well in a “head-to-head” atmosphere. With 5 players, it feels a bit too “player-saturated” to nurture good strategy. ~ Marsha