The forest seems to close behind you with every step. Pine needles soften your footsteps, branches catch at your clothes, and the trail you followed an hour ago has somehow disappeared. You have been searching for the lake all morning, following fragments of an old story about something that lives beyond the trees. The deeper you go, the quieter the forest becomes. Then the trees thin, revealing dark water between their trunks. Something moves beneath the surface. You stop at the water's edge as a shape slowly rises from the lake, ancient and impossible. You finally discover what you came looking for: Korpi by Antti Kukkonen from Hiirosoft.

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Like a lot of people, the board game hotness excites me because it potentially offers new mechanisms or clever twists on something familiar. Sometimes a new game draws me in because it has my favourite setting. When I finally hold the new game in my hands, the excitement continues when I read the rulebook, set up the game and pull levers or push buttons to see what happens. Yet, as amazing as new games often feel, the ones I return to most often are games that have become familiar friends. Somehow, knowing them so well has not made them any less interesting, but it has changed what I enjoy about them.

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The first pair of hands reached the table before the pattern card had settled. Nine cardboard cats were flipped, swapped and turned over in a frantic blur, followed by an excited slap that brought everything to a sudden halt. One tiny mistake was all it took for groans to turn into laughter before everyone eagerly reset their tiles for another attempt. Every new challenge promised to be straightforward, yet somehow each one encouraged just one more round of rearranging the Meow Tiles by Jean-Claude Pellin from Oink Games with art by Rie Takahashi.

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Imagine playing your very first indoor bowls game, but there is no jack. Everyone simply rolls a bowl towards an imaginary target. Somehow, your experienced opponent seems remarkably confident, while you try to copy what they do and hope for the best. At the end of the first end, someone reveals where the jack had been all along and awards the points accordingly. Then the second end goes in the same fashion, with a target that no one can see. Every end, you know how well you've done, but you never have any hope of getting better. Learning to bowl that way would feel practically impossible because every bowl would be complete guesswork. Surprisingly, some board games seem to want us to learn them in very much the same way.

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Snow muffled every footstep until the only sounds were distant birds and the steady crunch beneath our boots. The silence stretched in every direction: left to right, ahead and behind, as well as all the way up into the thermosphere. We were far away from anywhere. Yet, we knew we were safe. As the darkness settled all around us, we could finally see it: the Borealis: Arctic Expeditions by Dariusz Mindur from Lucky Duck Games with art by Rodrigo Camilo Alves De Almeida, Kevin Sidharta, Inês Toczyska and Ariadna Żytniewska.

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I never enjoyed history at school. I understood why it mattered as a subject, but learning names, dates and events off by rote simply didn’t work for me, no matter how hard I tried. Events were never taught in their chronological or geopolitical context. Things just didn’t make sense to me. So it seems ironic that historical board games are now one of my favourite genres. Of course, they’ve not made me any better at remembering names and dates, but they replaced my fear of history with a new curiosity that I hadn’t felt before. Horrible History To be clear: I never dreaded having history lessons because of my teachers. No, my fear came from somewhere else. Every new era of history introduced yet another collection of rulers, battles, dates and important events that I was expected to memorise. Learning those facts off by heart was just impossible for me. They always simply felt like a random collection of pieces of information that had nothing to hang them onto. So revising for history tests was always not just a terribly frustrating exercise, but often ended up in tears, because I realised that the further I fell behind, the harder things got. I often felt physically sick and had a tight knot in my chest when another exam was approaching. Somehow, history never felt like one very long connected story thread. Instead, it was just a giant jumble of disconnected facts that were supposed to fit together, but never really formed any sort of pattern for me. Of course, history is a hugely important subject. You don’t need to tell that to a German. Every war, political decision and social movement affected real people, families, communities and often, entire generations. Forgetting historic events means forgetting the people who experienced them, something…

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A small hand reaches into the tin, fingers excitedly hovering over the treats inside. The choice should be simple: take a biscuit, any biscuit. But no: two biscuits are better than one, and three better than two. Yet, if the little hand takes too long to make up its mind, the little burglar will be discovered. Well, it's time to Risk It For A Biscuit by Jessica Metheringham from Dissent Games.

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At a time when many people feel democratic culture is under strain, it is worth looking at our own everyday behaviours that allow democracy to function. Elections, laws and political institutions are all important, but democracy also depends on how people treat one another every day. Listening to different opinions, accepting compromise, respecting agreed-upon rules and recognising opponents as people rather than enemies are all part of a healthy democracy. Maybe unsurprisingly, board games are a place to look for those values. I mean, the simple act of sitting down together to play a game, following the same rules and taking on a role, is an opportunity to act out democratic values.

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You put down a bowl of soft food, and moments later, you hear the jingle of her collar. Here she comes! First, she pauses at the conservatory door and watches you for a while. You eagerly point at the wonderfully fresh food, enticing her to come in and eat. She turns away to look out into her domain, our back garden. Eventually, she strolls over - in her own time. Of course, whether she's ready for her lunch, when she eats, or indeed, where she eats, is all her own choice. As her pet dad, you just Take Cat by Gareth Edwards from Gibsons with art by Juliana Eigner.

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Colour is one of the first things I notice when opening a new board game. Bright player pieces, colourful resources and beautiful illustrations immediately grab my attention. Colours tell me where to look and how the game is organised. Yet, like around 1% of men, I have protanomaly, a mild form of red-green colour vision deficiency. I often see pink or purple flowers as blue, and when driving in fog, I see a car's rear red lights much later than other people. So I appreciate it when I can rely on something other than colour to tell me what I am looking at. In this article, I want to explore a century's worth of board game history and look at how colour-vision considerations have changed over time.

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The escape pod rattles violently as it tears through the atmosphere, before the noise suddenly fades away. A rough landing throws you against the restraints, leaving only silence until the hatch finally creaks open and fresh air rushes in with a long hiss. After you take off your helmet, you can smell unfamiliar scents. As you climb out of the pod, you can see a landscape unlike anything you have ever seen before. There are giant mountains that disappear into the clouds, strange plants that sway gently in the breeze, and countless mysteries that are waiting to be uncovered. You notice that you crashed high on a lonely hill, giving you a really good Vantage by Jamey Stegmaier from Stonemaier Games with art by Valentina Filic, Sören Meding and Emilien Rotival.

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Designing a board game that works well for exactly two players is a very different challenge from designing one that supports a range of player counts. Many games include a two-player mode, but board games such as 7 Wonders Duel, Patchwork, and Jaipur show that a dedicated head-to-head experience can be unique and not simply an adapted and reduced version of a game that is really aimed at larger player counts. In this article, I want to look at the design challenge these dedicated two-player-only games present.

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The early morning mist hangs beneath a canopy of dark green waxy leaves, while distant calls echo through the jungle from animals who have lost their way. You're following their footprints until you eventually glimpse a tail disappearing into the undergrowth. Working together, you manage to rescue one animal after another, but the falling grains of sand remind you that time is against you. So off you go deeper into the Grab Bag: Jungle by Rob M Harper and Mike Harrison-Wood from Gibsons with art by Lauren Heywood-Law.

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Over the previous four articles in this series, I have explored the history of Spiel des Jahres, the purpose behind its awards, the way its jury works, and the wider activities funded through its income. Together, those articles painted a picture of an organisation that sees its annual awards as a means rather than an end. Promoting games as a cultural asset, encouraging people to play board games together and providing guidance to newcomers to the hobby have all remained at the core of its mission for almost fifty years. In this article, I want to look at the 2026 nominations and see whether the association's values can also be found in the games the jury has selected.

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Mist drifts between towering trees where forgotten shrines stand undisturbed, their silent guardians waiting with quiet patience. Strange creatures emerge one by one, each offering hope while demanding sacrifice before another cautious step may be taken. Ancient legends promise a way to restore what has been lost, although every answer seems hidden behind another trial. The journey will be endless, as we discover the Eternal Decks by Hiroken from Tricktakers Games with art by Mujunsha.

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Awards often attract attention because of the games they recognise. Far less attention is usually paid to how the organisations behind those awards operate. In the case of Spiel des Jahres, the financial side of the story is particularly interesting because it helps explain how the association funds its activities while maintaining the independence that it considers central to its mission. The famous Red Pawn appears on millions of game boxes, yet many players know little about the licensing system behind it or the way that income supports projects far beyond the annual awards ceremony. In this fourth article in the series, I look at the finances that reveal how the organisation has transformed the commercial success of its award into support for a much broader cultural mission.

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A little rabbit peeked cautiously over the edge of a vegetable patch, before it hopped inside and helped itself to a crunchy carrot. Soon, another rabbit joined in, nibbling happily on a radish, while a third disappeared behind broad broccoli leaves, and a fourth emerged triumphantly with an aubergine. Soon enough, mushrooms vanished as well, leaving only tiny paw prints behind. In less than a minute, the whole patch was filled with Rascally Rabbits by Ta-Te Wu from Sunrise Tornado Game Studio with art by TuziNeko.

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The saloon doors suddenly burst open behind you as your boots skid across the dusty wooden boards of the sidewalk. A split-second later, gunfire cracks through the afternoon air, the bullet ricocheting off a pail of water, sending startled townsfolk diving for cover. Diving behind an old barrel offers you a moment of shelter, although the sound of heavy footsteps suggests your pursuer is closing in on you. Then, glass shatters somewhere near the jail, followed by the sharp whistle of a bullet passing far too close for comfort. A grin spreads across your face as you raise your revolver and prepare to return fire. Well, that's what you get when you arrive in Rattlesnake by Michael Hardacre from Osprey Games with art by Roland MacDonald.

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Every year, the announcement of the Spiel des Jahres nominations leads to a lot of discussion across our hobby. Some people agree with the choices, others question why certain games were not included, and many try to predict the eventual winners. What most people don't realise when they discuss the nominations is that the jury does not gather for a single weekend to decide the best game of the year. No, jurors spend many months playing hundreds of new releases several times with different groups of people. It is a lot of work that often goes unnoticed, but that explains why the award continues to carry such influence nearly fifty years after it began. In the second article of the series, I look at this in more detail.

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