Learning about birds in Bengaluru just became all fun and games

Bengaluru-based researcher and game designer duo have created an exciting board game that allows players to learn about the city’s bird life

Bengaluru is revered as the Garden City of India. And why not? After all, it has plenty of flora and fauna and is home to several bird species. Banking on the city’s rich biodiversity are ecologist-researcher Priti Bangal and game designer Prasad Sandbhor with their upcoming game titled Birds in the City.

Priti Bangal and Prasad Sandbhor have created a collaborative board game talking all about birds

“I have been working on bird communities and behaviour for the last decade. Prasad and I would often discuss ideas related to both our work, and our first game called Flocks came about during my research on forest birds. I wanted my research to reach the public and Prasad and I thought a fun way to do science outreach would be through a game. We played it with our friends and family and were often asked if there were any games focusing on the birds in the city. That’s when we decided our next project would be on the birds that are all around us,” Bangal tells us.

Birds in the City, a collaborative board game, is based on the concept of team work. It allows players to build the city in a way that attracts more bird species.

“The vision was to explore playfulness in the things that exist in Nature. We wanted to tap into a format that lets people enjoy the concept and then get engaged with it, eventually learning something,” Sandbhor elucidates.

The Bengalurean-duo started working on the game in late 2021, and are looking forward to its launch this April. “The work on the game started off in August 2021 when we received a grant from the Bengaluru Sustainability Forum Small Grants Program. The process of our game design was very iterative where we designed smaller bits of the game, play-tested it and then continued building on it,” Sandbhor shares.

“An important part of the game is to keep the conversation between players alive, on the topic of birds. We hope to keep updating the game over time, and explore the game concept further for other cities in India too,” Bangal wraps up.