Tag Archives: SETI: Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence

Essen 2025

Today is the conclusion of the largest annual gathering of gamers in Europe. The Internationale Spieltage is known to gamers worldwide simply as “SPIEL” or “Essen” and is a four day fair with lots of new releases scheduled to coincide with the event, just in time for Christmas sales. This year, there have been lots of exciting new games available to be seen including Galactic Cruise, Brick Like This!, Forest Shuffle: Dartmoor, Waddle, Orloj: The Prague Astronomical Clock (which was sold out before the end of the first day) and Origin Story (which was sold out by Friday).

– Image by boardGOATS

In addition to new games, the rise of crowd funding has had a large impact, and increasingly there are stands presenting current live projects in the hope of seccuring additional backers. Examples of this included, Eldertide: A Thousand Lights, the Lodges expansion to Kavango, Cascadia: Alpine Lakes, AstroNavigators, and the re-release of Nippon to name just a few. There have been a lot of really good deals to be had too, and there will be even more on the final day today. It was with sadness though that the Snowdonia spin-off, Alubari was found at a discounter for €15, as this was a great game released with much fanfare a few years ago.

– Image by boardGOATS

Old favourites typically often get a new lease of life with the release of expansions. This year, relatively recent releases like SETI (which was confirmed as the winner of the Deutscher Spiele Preis), Faraway, Castle Combo and Windmill Valley recieved new additions, but older games like Underwater Cities and Wingspan also got some love (with the new Data Era expansion and the fan-designed promo packs). As well as new games and expansions, there were also a number of re-releases of old favourites including Ra, Bohnanza (with Dahlia artwork) and Botswana, and even Ticket to Ride which has had a bit of a face-lift with new artwork.

– Image by boardGOATS

For those that were prepared to stay late on Friday, there was a world record attempt for the most people playing The Settlers of Catan together. This was achieved with CATAN-Connect, which is a new version of the game designed for large parties that has large groups playing around single islands with elements of simultaneous play and everyone working to one electronic dice roll and a timer. The record had been set at Essen in 2015 with one thousand and forty, only for Rotterdam to set a new record two years later with one thousand and ninety-six. At SPIEL, one thousand, one hundred and seventy players joined in the game (watched by a few more who were just curous), successfully bringing the world record back to Germany where it arguably belongs.

– Image by boardGOATS

Deutscher Spiele Preis – 2025

The Deutscher Spiele Preis is awarded anually based on an open vote from German games clubs, gamers in German-speaking countries and people in the gaming industry. It recognises the “Best Children’s Game” and a top ten list of the “Best Family and Adult Games”. Although the order of the top three in each category won’t be announced until the Internationale Spieltage in Essen at the end of October, the list of winning games has been released.

– Image by BGG contributor tobsn,
adapted by boardGOATS

The top three in the general category in alphabetical order are:

Bomb Busters
Endeavor: Tiefsee (aka Endeavour: Deep Sea)
SETI: Auf der Suche nach außerirdischen Leben (aka SETI: Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence)

The remaining list of games in the top ten are:

Castle Combo
Faraway
Civolution
Blood on the Clocktower
Slay the Spire: Das Brettspiel (aka Slay the Spire: The Board Game)
Astrobienen (aka Apiary)
Dune: Imperium — Uprising

The games named in the Deutscher Spiele Preis lists often intersect with the winners and nominees of the annual Spiel des Jahres Award. This time is no exception, indeed the only game in the top five Deutscher Spiele Preis list not to have recieved a Spiel des Jahres award or a nomination likely missed out because it was considered too complex. And therein lies much of the difference between the two: the Spiel des Jahres nominees/winners are chosen by a committee with a list of strict criteria, whereas the Deutscher Spiele Preis is more like a list of the most popular games of the preceding year, with the gaming public having a strong say. As a result, the Deutscher Spiele Preis often includes heavier games.

– Image by BGG contributor spiritraw,
adapted by boardGOATS

The top three children’s games (again in alphabetical order) are, Cascadia Junior, Die kleinen Alchemisten (aka Little Alchemists), and Die Sandburgen von Burgund (aka The Sandcastles of Burgundy). The order of the top three in both categories will be announced at the press conference on Wednesday 22^nd October; congratulations to everyone on the list.

– Image from
spiel-essen.com

Golden Geek Awards – 2025

The winners of BoardGameGeek‘s Golden Geek Awards have been announced this month. There are many Game awards, with the foremost being the Spiel des Jahres Awards and Deutscher Spiele Preis, Both of these are German in origin, with the Spiel des Jahres awards chosen by a panel of experts and the Deutscher Spiele Preis resulting from an open vote by games clubs, gamers and people in the industry. In contrast, the Golden Geek Awards are voted on by the users of the BoardGameGeek websiteflavour which gives them a slightly different . There are over a dozen categories, but winners include Arcs, Castle Combo, Harmonies, SETI and Flip 7 with Fromage, Let’s Go! To Japan, Captain Flip, Heat: Heavy Rain, and Forest Shuffle: Alpine featuring among the runners up.

– from youtube.com

Boardgames in the News: HandyCon Games Theft

HandyCon is a board game convention that takes place, roughly quarterly, in Milton Keynes. Unlike other board gaming events like UK Games Expo and SPIEL, HandyCon is not a trade fair, but a convention where hundreds of people meet to play games together. While many people bring their own games, one of the highlights is the Games Library which included over five hundred games and expansions. The last event took place two weeks ago, 17^th-19^th January, but last Monday night while, he was playing football in Luton, the organiser, Paul Frohnsdorff-Harris had his car broken into and £700-800 of games stolen. As is often the case with theft, the replacement value is one thing, but more important is the sentimental value.

– Image from facebook.com

The games were all from Paul’s collection but were used as part of the HandyCon Games Library, and therefore almost all have HandyCon stickers on the lid. The missing games comprise a wide variety, everything from classics like Dominion, Takenoko and 7 Wonders to new games like SETI, Shackleton Base, and Arcs. There are also some rarities, like one of the first copies of Misheard Lyrics which was the first published game credited to Paul Frohnsdorff-Harris himself. This morning the theft featured on BBC Beds Herts & Bucks Radio with an accompanying article on the BBC News website. Although it is unlikely, it would be great if gamers could find these games and reunite them with their owner (and maybe even catch the thief in the process).

– Image from facebook.com