Spiel des Jahres 2022 predictions

 Posted on May 16, 2022  |  8 minutes  |  1638 words  |  Markus Shepherd

Spiel des Jahres 2022 is around the corner! (Has it really been a year already since we last spoke with each other? 😅) We’re blessed with another strong year full of wonderful games that all compete for the most prestigious awards in board gaming. 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 23rd. [Read More]
SdJ  SdJ 2022  Spiel des Jahres  Spiel des Jahres 2022  KSdJ  Kennerspiel  Kennerspiel des Jahres  Kennerspiel des Jahres 2022  Game of the Year  Germany  Predictions  Spiel des Jahres predictions  Spiel des Jahres 2022 predictions  SdJ predictions  Kennerspiel predictions  Kennerspiel des Jahres predictions  Kennerspiel des Jahres 2022 predictions 

Recommend.Games ranking explained

 Posted on February 22, 2022  |  6 minutes  |  1123 words  |  Markus Shepherd

We have some pretty exciting news! 🤩 Since 2022-02-22, we’ve been using a new and improved ranking as the default sorting for our front page at Recommend.Games. … What do you mean, you haven’t noticed there’s a R.G ranking? You know, that thing that’s referenced in the statistics? … You haven’t ever opened that view?!? 😱 OK, let’s back up for a second. R.G’s primary purpose is a recommendation engine, that is, finding personalised game recommendations based on a user’s preferences (in this case as expressed through their BoardGameGeek ratings). [Read More]
news  ranking  highest rated games  alternative rankings 

Spiel des Jahres 2021 winners

 Posted on July 27, 2021  |  3 minutes  |  473 words  |  Markus Shepherd

The cat’s out of the bag and the winners have been announced! This article is more than a week overdue, but I’ve been on my first trip1 abroad since, you know… (In a sense that was the first time in a year and a half I wasn’t abroad. 🤷) So without further delays, here are the winners of Spiel des Jahres and Kennerspiel des Jahres 2021! Spiel des Jahres 2021 MicroMacro: Crime City 1–4 players, 15–45 minutes, 10+ years, light (1. [Read More]
SdJ  SdJ 2021  Spiel des Jahres  Spiel des Jahres 2021  KSdJ  Kennerspiel  Kennerspiel des Jahres  Kennerspiel des Jahres 2021  Winners  Game of the Year  Germany  The Adventures of Robin Hood  MicroMacro: Crime City  Zombie Teenz Evolution  Fantasy Realms  Lost Ruins of Arnak  Paleo 

Spiel des Jahres 2021 predictions – Part 2!

 Posted on July 14, 2021  |  11 minutes  |  2210 words  |  Markus Shepherd

It’s time! On Monday, July 19, we will finally know which games won Spiel des Jahres and Kennerspiel des Jahres 2021. I really think this is an exciting year with six very strong nominees that all have a lot of arguments going for themselves (and a few against). Even after following the whole year releases very closely, I’m still torn as to who’d be the favourites to win. Algorithms won’t be much help here either – the sample is just too small. [Read More]
SdJ  SdJ 2021  Spiel des Jahres  Spiel des Jahres 2021  KSdJ  Kennerspiel  Kennerspiel des Jahres  Kennerspiel des Jahres 2021  Game of the Year  Germany  Predictions  Spiel des Jahres nominations  Spiel des Jahres 2021 nominations  SdJ nominations  Kennerspiel nominations  Kennerspiel des Jahres nominations  Kennerspiel des Jahres 2021 nominations  The Adventures of Robin Hood  MicroMacro: Crime City  Zombie Teenz Evolution  Fantasy Realms  Lost Ruins of Arnak  Paleo 

Spiel des Jahres 2021 nominations

 Posted on May 18, 2021  |  6 minutes  |  1218 words  |  Markus Shepherd

Nominations are out! The jury selected a total of fifteen games for their longlist, eight for Spiel des Jahres and seven for Kennerspiel des Jahres. Out of these games, three games each are nominated for both awards and can hope to get the coveted meeple added to their covers on July 19. Let’s dive straight into the nominations and recommendations, before we discuss how good (or bad) my predictions were and if the Kennerspiel score is any good. [Read More]
SdJ  SdJ 2021  Spiel des Jahres  Spiel des Jahres 2021  KSdJ  Kennerspiel  Kennerspiel des Jahres  Kennerspiel des Jahres 2021  Game of the Year  Germany  Predictions  Spiel des Jahres nominations  Spiel des Jahres 2021 nominations  SdJ nominations  Kennerspiel nominations  Kennerspiel des Jahres nominations  Kennerspiel des Jahres 2021 nominations  The Adventures of Robin Hood  MicroMacro: Crime City  Zombie Teenz Evolution  Fantasy Realms  Lost Ruins of Arnak  Paleo 

Spiel des Jahres 2021 predictions

 Posted on May 14, 2021  |  9 minutes  |  1830 words  |  Markus Shepherd

It’s our favourite time of the year again: time for Spiel des Jahres nominations! On Monday, May 17th, the jury will once again announce their longlist (aka recommendations) and shortlist (aka nominations) for Spiel des Jahres, Kennerspiel des Jahres and Kinderspiel des Jahres 2021. Just like last year, I’ll try to produce a list of the most promising games to land on the longlist for Spiel and Kennerspiel. (I’ll promise to get around to Kinderspiel predictions in a couple of years. [Read More]
SdJ  SdJ 2021  Spiel des Jahres  Spiel des Jahres 2021  KSdJ  Kennerspiel  Kennerspiel des Jahres  Kennerspiel des Jahres 2021  Game of the Year  Germany  Predictions  Spiel des Jahres predictions  Spiel des Jahres 2021 predictions  SdJ predictions  Kennerspiel predictions  Kennerspiel des Jahres predictions  Kennerspiel des Jahres 2021 predictions 

What makes a Kennerspiel?

 Posted on February 22, 2021  |  11 minutes  |  2291 words  |  Markus Shepherd

Spiel des Jahres 2021 nominations might still be a couple of months away, but I thought now is still a good time to return to one of the harder questions in my predictions post from last year: What exactly makes a game a Kennerspiel? By that I don’t mean the qualities that earn a game the award, but the distinction between the more casual Spiel and the more complex Kennerspiel categories. [Read More]
SdJ  Spiel des Jahres  KSdJ  Kennerspiel  Kennerspiel des Jahres  Game of the Year  Germany  Logistic regression  Spiel des Jahres 2021 predictions 

Reverse engineering the BoardGameGeek ranking – Part 2!

 Posted on January 26, 2021  |  3 minutes  |  533 words  |  Markus Shepherd

This is the second part of a series explaining and analysing the BoardGameGeek rankings. Read the first part here. Last time I left you with the nice result that BoardGameGeek (BGG) calculates its ranking by taking users’ ratings for a particular game and then add around 1500-1600 dummy ratings of 5.5. This so-called geek score is used to sort the games from best (Gloomhaven) to worst (Tic-Tac-Toe). One detail however we touched on in passing, but did not resolve, is how that number of dummy ratings develop over time. [Read More]
BoardGameGeek  BGG  ranking  rating  statistics  Bayesian  geek score  top 100  dummy ratings  highest rated games  circle of hype 

Reverse engineering the BoardGameGeek ranking

 Posted on October 3, 2020  |  13 minutes  |  2607 words  |  Markus Shepherd

TL;DR: BoardGameGeek calculates its ranking by adding around 1500-1600 dummy ratings of 5.5 to the regular users’ ratings. They called it their geek score, statisticians call it a Bayesian average. We use this knowledge to calculate some alternative rankings. I often describe BoardGameGeek (BGG) as “the Internet Movie Database (IMDb) for games”. Much like its cinematic counterpart, the biggest board game database not only collects all sorts of information obsessively, but also allows users to rate games on a scale from 1 (awful - defies game description) to 10 (outstanding - will always enjoy playing). [Read More]
BoardGameGeek  BGG  ranking  rating  statistics  Bayesian  geek score  top 100  dummy ratings  highest rated games  alternative rankings 

And the Spiel des Jahres 2020 goes to… Part 4!

 Posted on July 22, 2020  |  3 minutes  |  467 words  |  Markus Shepherd

After months of waiting, we finally know what games won this year’s Spiel des Jahres and Kennerspiel des Jahres! Without further ado, I’ll present the winners along with a comment on how the predictions went. Spiel des Jahres 2020 Pictures Reading through the comments on the interweb most players seem surprised about the winner of the red meeple. Not me! It was on my list from the very beginning as probably the strongest contender. [Read More]
SdJ  Spiel des Jahres  Spiel des Jahres 2020  KSdJ  Kennerspiel  Kennerspiel des Jahres  Kennerspiel des Jahres 2020  Game of the Year  Germany  My City  Nova Luna  Pictures  Cartographers  The Crew  King's Dilemma  Daniela Stöhr  Christian Stöhr