Spiel des Jahres

Agricola

Tabletop Tuesdays: Can't Plow the Back Forty, the Millers Are Plowing Today

Type:
Tabletop
Developer:
Uwe Rosenberg

Agricola is a bit of a departure for Uwe Rosenberg, previously best known for his tight, engaging cardgame, Bohnanza. Agricola is instead a big, sprawling game, quite complicated by the standards of the Eurostyle, and "tight" is not quite the word.

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Mamma Mia!

Tabletop Tuesdays: Let's Make Pizzas

Type:
Tabletop
Developer:
Uwe Rosenberg

A finalist for the Spiel des Jahres award in 1999, Uwe Rosenberg's Mamma Mia! is not as well known, or arguably as deep, as his game Bohnanza, but it's a good game for a party setting, accessible enough for kids and yet with just enough strategy to hold the interest of sterner gamers.

From a game design perspective, it's interesting because there are essentially three layers to the game.


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Lord of The Rings

Tabletop Tuesdays: One Game To Rule Them All

Type:
Tabletop
Developer:
Reiner Knizia

Lord of the Rings is an impressive adaptation of the classic story to boardgame format. The Lord of the Rings books, as beloved as they are, don’t quite fit the normal boardgame mold and could easily become a game with little more than a Tolkienesque flavor. Luckily for us, world renowned game designer Reiner Knizia decided to tackle the challenge. The result distills the essence of Tolkien’s epic into an innovative, engaging, and exciting experience.


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Hare and Tortoise

A Game for Vulcan Children

Type:
Tabletop
Developer:
David Parlett

"A game for Vulcan children" is how Kevin Maroney once described Hare and Tortoise (Hase und Igel in the German -- apparently German hares race hedgehogs). It's an apt description; the game has the external indicia of a child's game -- cute little animals drawn from a childhood fable -- but actually, it's a game of exceptional mathematical and logical rigor.


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Torres

Tabletop Tuesdays: Abstract Three Dimensional Strategy

Type:
Tabletop
Developer:
Wolfgang Kramer & Michael Kiesling

Torres, winner of the 2000 Spiel des Jahres award, is essentially a game of competitive collaboration in tower-building. Played on an eight-by-eight grid, players place plastic "tower blocks", building both outward and upward.


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Settlers of Catan

Tabletop Tuesdays

Type:
Tabletop
Developer:
Klaus Teuber

If you were in one of a handful of places in 1995 in the United States, you knew that a revolution was starting. It's been going on quietly ever since, even though most people are still blissfully ignorant of it. This game, Settlers of Catan, was the opening shot.


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Alhambra

Tabletop Tuesdays: Build the Best Pleasure Dome

Type:
Tabletop
Developer:
Dirk Henn

Alhambra combines bidding, building and planning in an unusual and engaging board game. It's the successor of Henn’s earlier stock market game, Stimmt So, but Alhambra has been reworked with a Moorish theme and a tile-layering component. The object of the game is simple: using tiles depicting different building components and with different walls, each player tries to make the best (and biggest) Alhambra possible. Gameplay is simple, rules straightforward, but execution can be very complex. Here's how it works:


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