Spiel des Jahres

Spiel des Jahres 2024 predictions – Part 2!

Posted on July 8, 2024 | 9 minutes | 1739 words | Markus Shepherd

The waiting is finally coming to an end! On Sunday, July 21, the jury will announce the winners of Spiel des Jahres and Kennerspiel des Jahres 2024. We’re blessed with another year of very strong games and I’m certainly very excited to learn what games will win the two awards. I’ve been doing this for four years now and I’ve called seven out of the eight winners correctly. No reason to rest on any laurels – there’s another batch of awards coming up, and this year might be the closest race yet! [Read More]

Thoughts on Spiel des Jahres

What it is and what it isn't

Posted on June 26, 2024 | 15 minutes | 3141 words | Markus Shepherd

Some of you might have notices that I’m a bit of a Spiel des Jahres fanboy. 🙃 Every year when the award season rolls around, the discussion about the purpose and the influence of Spiel des Jahres comes up again. So I thought it’s a good idea to collect my thoughts on the subject in one handy place I can easily reference in the future. 🤓 What’s the purpose of Spiel des Jahres? [Read More]

Spiel des Jahres

Spiel des Jahres 2024 nominations

Posted on June 11, 2024 | 3 minutes | 593 words | Markus Shepherd

Nominations are out! The jury selected a total of sixteen games for their longlist, nine for Spiel des Jahres and seven for Kennerspiel des Jahres. Out of these games, three games each are nominated for the two awards and can hope to get the coveted meeple added to their covers on July 21. Let’s dive straight into the nominations and recommendations, before we discuss how good (or bad) my predictions were and if the agreed with our Kennerspiel score. [Read More]

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Spiel des Jahres 2024 predictions

Posted on May 31, 2024 | 8 minutes | 1509 words | Markus Shepherd

Spiel des Jahres 2024 is around the corner! As in the previous four years, I’ll try to predict what games have the best shot at ending up on the longlist (aka recommendations) and the shortlist (aka nominations) when the jury announces their picks on June 11th. As every year, I’ll let the algorithms speak, but I’ve added something new this year: I tried to track the jury members’ reviews of all eligible1 games, in particular when they publish scores (such as in the magazine Spielbox), and fed those into the predictions. [Read More]

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Game Designer Hall of Fame

The best board game designers of all times – according to Spiel des Jahres

Posted on May 17, 2024 | 11 minutes | 2240 words | Markus Shepherd

Spiel des Jahres 2024 nominations are just around the corner (watch this space for our annual predictions), but I wanted to take this opportunity for a look back over the history of the award. Specifically, I wanted to see which designers have been most successful at the Spiel, Kennerspiel and Kinderspiel des Jahres awards. The first red meeple was given out in 1979. Since 1989, the jury also awarded the Kinderspiel des Jahres for children’s games, initially as an annual special award, and from 2001 as its own award with the blue meeple. [Read More]

Spiel des Jahres Kennerspiel des Jahres Kinderspiel des Jahres Game of the Year Hall of Fame Designers Records Statistics Wolfgang Kramer Reiner Knizia

Spiel des Jahres 2023 winners

Posted on July 31, 2023 | 4 minutes | 728 words | Markus Shepherd

The cat’s out of the bag and the winners have been announced! This year’s show was… long… On the one hand, it’s nice to have all three awards (including the Kinderspiel) back together in one announcement, but on the other hand, once you add special awards, the review of the 1983 awards, interviews etc, even die hard fans (and obviously I’m one of them) have a hard time keeping their attention up. [Read More]

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Spiel des Jahres 2023 predictions – Part 2!

Posted on July 13, 2023 | 10 minutes | 1973 words | Markus Shepherd

The waiting is finally coming to an end! On Sunday, July 16, the jury will announce the winners of Spiel des Jahres and Kennerspiel des Jahres 2023. We’re blessed with another year of very strong games and I’m certainly very excited to learn what games will win the two awards. After two years of calling both winners correctly, I’ve missed the Spiel des Jahres 2022 winner Cascadia last year, so I hope I’ll do better this year. [Read More]

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Spiel des Jahres 2023 nominations

Posted on July 2, 2023 | 5 minutes | 993 words | Markus Shepherd

Nominations are out! The jury selected a total of fifteen games for their longlist, ten for Spiel des Jahres and five for Kennerspiel des Jahres. Out of these games, three games each are nominated for the two awards and can hope to get the coveted meeple added to their covers on July 16. Let’s dive straight into the nominations and recommendations, before we discuss how good (or bad) my predictions were and if the agreed with our Kennerspiel score. [Read More]

SdJ SdJ 2023 Spiel des Jahres Spiel des Jahres 2023 KSdJ Kennerspiel Kennerspiel des Jahres Kennerspiel des Jahres 2023 Game of the Year Germany Predictions Spiel des Jahres nominations Spiel des Jahres 2023 nominations SdJ nominations Kennerspiel nominations Kennerspiel des Jahres nominations Kennerspiel des Jahres 2023 nominations Dorfromantik Fun Facts Next Station: London Challengers! IKI Planet Unknown Unlock!

Spiel des Jahres 2023 predictions

Posted on May 20, 2023 | 5 minutes | 1001 words | Markus Shepherd

Spiel des Jahres 2023 is around the corner! As in the previous years, I’ll try to predict what games have the best shot at ending up on the longlist (aka recommendations) and the shortlist (aka nominations) when the jury announces their picks on May 22nd. As every year, I’ll let the algorithms speak. The predictions for the longlist come directly from the recommendendations out of all eligible1 games. Our very own Kennerspiel score is then used to sort those into their respective list of the top 10 contenders for either award. [Read More]

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Spiel des Jahres 2022 winners

Posted on July 16, 2022 | 2 minutes | 395 words | Markus Shepherd

The cat’s out of the bag and the winners have been announced! As mentioned before, this year was the first time the ceremony was held on a Saturday evening and I had the immense pleasure of attending it in person. In case you missed my very profesional live coverage on Twitter, here’s a summary of the event. But without further ado, here are the winners of Spiel des Jahres and Kennerspiel des Jahres 2022! [Read More]

SdJ SdJ 2022 Spiel des Jahres Spiel des Jahres 2022 KSdJ Kennerspiel Kennerspiel des Jahres Kennerspiel des Jahres 2022 Winners Game of the Year Germany Cascadia SCOUT Top Ten Cryptid Dune: Imperium Living Forest