I’m well known by friends and family to be an animal nerd and boardgame enthusiast. I thought, why not combine the two and attempt to design an animal themed boardgame that dives into both passions. The general concept was sparked during a family visit to Yellowstone National Park.  My wife, Misty, and I had never seen so much diversity of wildlife in one place and of course I had to make a small competition out of it.
Every animal we saw became eligible for this new little game. We could recruit any five of these eligible animals and place them into tiers that we agreed upon. Each of us could only have one tier-1 animal, two tier-2 animals, and three tier-3 animals. The idea was to end up with the most functional grouping, which of course was subjective. Debating whose team of animals was superior and for what reasons based on their combined attributes was most of the fun.
If I recall correctly, Misty ended up with a Bison, Bald Eagle, Pronghorn, Marmont, and Elk. She was proud of her balanced approach of muscle, flight, speed, burrowing ability and well…cuteness. I think, I ended up with the Wolf, Black Bear, Coyote, Raven and Weasel and I was confident that by leaning into attacking and cunning attributes, my team of animals would reign supreme.
Many months later when beginning to design Unclaimed, a goal of mine was to tap into the type of fun decision making from our Yellowstone competition. In Unclaimed, the animal tiers are less obvious, but they are still there in the form of recruitment cost. In addition, players will notice that only animals they have seen, whether from their hand or face on the board, are eligible for recruitment. In these ways, I feel I’ve brought to life a more strategic and engaging form of the simple game my wife and I enjoyed during an unforgettable trip to one of our nation’s amazing national parks.