Ark Nova: Marine Worlds

Your zoo is doing well, but you have a corner of the property zoned for water and a new directive: bring marine life onto the campus. Suddenly the cards in front of you are penguins and seals and sharks instead of rhinos, and you are figuring out where to slot an aquarium in a workspace that was already half-built.

Marine Worlds is the first major expansion for Ark Nova. It introduces an entirely new enclosure type, the aquarium, and the marine animals that need it. There is also a fourth University track that gives you guaranteed access to one animal icon of your choice, plus alternate versions of all five base action cards with small bonuses you can mix into your starting hand.

What makes the expansion work is how surgical the additions are. Designer Mathias Wigge could have piled on new systems. Instead the alternate action cards let you reshape the rhythm of your turns by swapping in two different versions before the game starts, so each game feels familiar but plays a little differently.

This is for groups already in love with Ark Nova who want more variety without rewriting the rules. New Zoo cards, Final Scoring cards, and Bonus tiles drop into the existing decks, so the expansion does not add complexity for its own sake. The upgraded wooden track markers and conservation animals are a nice quality-of-life lift too.

Requires the Ark Nova base game. If you have only played the base a few times, finish a couple more sessions before adding this. The expansion shines when you can already see the strategy of the core game clearly.