Objective of the Game

Welcome, aspiring park managers! In Bärenpark, your goal is to build the most impressive bear park by skillfully arranging enclosures, animal houses, and green areas. Every inch of your land counts, and the faster you build, the more valuable your creations become. When one player fills their park, the game ends, and the player with the most points wins!

Preparation (Setup)

Let's get your park ready for its grand opening! Here’s how to set up your game:

1. Place the Supply Board in the center of your playing area. This board is where all your lovely Green Areas, Animal Houses, and Enclosures will be stored.
2. Stack the Green Areas on their designated spaces. Use all Toilets and Playgrounds. For Food Streets and Rivers, use only four of each per player, returning the rest to the game box. The exact numbers are on the Supply Board.
3. Select the appropriate Animal Houses based on the number of players (this info is also on the Supply Board). Stack these tiles by shape on their designated spaces, sorting them from lowest value (bottom) to highest value (top). For example, in a two-player game, each pile would be 6-4-2 from top to bottom.
4. Place all Enclosures on their designated spaces. You'll always use all of them, regardless of player count.
5. Lay out the Bear Statues next to the game board in numerical order. Again, the number of players determines which values you'll use, so check the table and return unused statues to the box.
6. Shuffle the 12 Park Areas without an Entrance and create two piles of six tiles each, within everyone's reach. Only the top tile of each pile should be visible.
7. Each player receives a random Park Area with an Entrance. Place it in front of you so the Entrance is closest to you and the icons are correctly oriented. This is the starting point of your magnificent park! (Don't worry about the different nationalities on the Entrances; they're just for flavor.)
8. Determine the starting player. The player who last visited an animal park takes the honors, or you can choose randomly.
   • The starting player receives a Toilet.
   • The second player receives a Playground.
   • If there's a third player, they receive a Playground (in a 2-player game, this step is skipped). In a 3-player game, the third player gets a Food Street instead of a Playground.
   • If there's a fourth player, they receive a Food Street.
   Place your starting tile in front of you; this is your initial supply.

The Turn of Play

Play proceeds clockwise, starting with the first player. Each turn consists of three exciting steps:

A - Place a Tile

First things first: you must place exactly one tile from your personal supply into your park. Even if you have a bounty of tiles, only one per turn! If you can't place a tile, you'll have to pass (more on that later).

Here are the golden rules for placing tiles:

• No overlapping other tiles.
• No hanging over the edge of your park (though a tile can span multiple Park Areas).
• You cannot cover the central Pit square on a Park Area.
• The tile must fit within the marked spaces of your park.
• Feel free to rotate and/or flip the tile however you need to!
• The tile must be orthogonally adjacent (no diagonals!) to another tile you've already placed. The very first tile you place in the game is the only exception; it can go anywhere as long as it follows the other rules.

B - Evaluate Icons

After placing your tile, it's time to reap the rewards! You'll evaluate any icons you covered with your newly placed tile. If you cover multiple icons, you can resolve them in any order you choose. Most icons will grant you new tiles for your supply (and there's no limit to how many tiles you can hoard!).

• Green Wheelbarrow: Take any Green Area tile (Toilet, Playground, Food Street, or River) from the Supply Board and add it to your supply. If a pile runs out, tough luck – you can't take any more of that type.
• White Cement Truck: Take the top Animal House tile from any pile on the Supply Board (Polar Bears, Gobi Bears, Koalas, or Pandas) and add it to your supply. Alternatively, you can choose to take any Green Area instead. Remember, if a pile is empty, you can't take from it. The white symbols on these tiles indicate their point values.
• Orange Excavator: Take any Enclosure tile from the Supply Board and add it to your supply. Alternatively, you can choose to take any Green Area or Animal House instead. The orange symbols on Enclosures also show their point values.
• Construction Crew: This is a big one! Take the top Park Area tile from one of the two piles. If one pile is empty, you must choose from the other. Immediately add this new Park Area to your park following these rules:
  • It must be orthogonally adjacent to another Park Area already in your park, with their edges perfectly aligned.
  • All icons on the new Park Area must be correctly oriented from your point of view (bottom of the icon pointing towards you).
  • You cannot place it "below" your Entrance, meaning it can't be closer to you on the table than your starting Entrance Park Area.

  Important! You can only have a maximum of four Park Areas in total. If you cover your fourth Construction Crew icon, you don't get another Park Area!

C - Place a Bear Statue

Finally, check if you've completed any Park Areas (with or without an Entrance) this turn by covering all spaces on it (except the Pit). If you have, congratulations! Take the Bear Statue tile with the highest available value from the supply and place it on the Pit of the newly completed Park Area. If you complete multiple Park Areas in a single turn, you get a Bear Statue for each one!

Passing

If it's your turn and you have no tile in your supply that you can legally place in your park, you must pass. When you pass, you take a free Green Area of your choice (Toilet, Playground, Food Street, or River) from the Supply Board and add it to your supply. Your turn then ends immediately. You can only place this free tile on your next turn. You may not pass if you are able to place a tile.

End of Game and Scoring

The game reaches its exciting conclusion when one player completes all four of their Park Areas. Once that happens, every other player gets one final turn. After those last turns, it's time to score your parks!

To calculate your final score, simply add up all the point values on the tiles in your park, including any shiny Bear Statues you've collected. The player with the most points wins! In case of a tie, the tied players sum the point values of any tiles remaining in their supply (tiles they didn't place). The player with the highest value from their unplaced tiles breaks the tie. If there's still a tie, well, you've got multiple winners!

Tips for Winning

Want to build a truly magnificent Bärenpark? Keep these tips in mind:

1. Plan Your Park Expansion: Don't just place tiles randomly! Think about how you'll expand your park by covering Construction Crew icons to gain new Park Areas. Strategically placing these new areas can open up more building opportunities.
2. Prioritize Bear Statues: Completing Park Areas quickly to claim those high-value Bear Statues can give you a significant point boost. Keep an eye on which Park Areas are close to completion and try to finish them before your opponents grab the best statues.
3. Icon Efficiency is Key: When placing a tile, try to cover as many valuable icons as possible. Getting multiple new tiles in one go (especially Animal Houses or Enclosures) will give you more options for future turns and help you fill your park faster.