Grackles

As the sun goes down over the American southwest, the grackles settle on the telephone wires. Shiny, noisy birds that love to sit side by side in a row. In Grackles you bring that bustle to your table and try to get as many of your birds on the wire as you can. Each turn you choose what you do. You take a tile and place it, you connect two spots on the wire with your birds, you make a row of birds longer, or you turn an empty tile the right way up. Bit by bit the playing area grows into a grid of five by five tiles. Small choices, but together they decide who ends up with the most birds on the line. When the board is full and every spot on the wire is taken, everyone counts their birds. Whoever has the most grackles on the telephone wire wins. Great for two to four players and easy to get going, because a game takes about half an hour.