We host Owl House Game Day on the second Saturday of each month. We called it Owl House in honor of the family of northern saw-whet owls that slipped into the trees around the house when we moved in year ago. We’d hear their calls in the dusk of morning and evening. The call is a delightful descending trill and well worth the effort to find a recording of it. But this month’s game day will be the only one for this project, and I’ve been a little sad about that. I was also a bit frustrated not to be able to think of a theme for the game day—I like to have a little theme to go along with the invitations to the players—until one came to me last night:
Spiel des Jahres.
The Spiel des Jahres (or SdJ, for the congniscenti) is the German Game of the Year. At this point, Germany is the beating heart of boardgaming in the world, so the SdJ is a major award. A game that wins it is guaranteed a long, healthy print run as stores in Germany stock it and hobbyists across the world line up to buy it—or suggest that someone in their game group by it.
The SdJ, though, is a family gaming award. A sort of middle-of-the-road game that should be able to be played by everyone. Recently, the SdJ committee has added a couple of secondary award. The first is for children’s games, and the second—called the Spiel des Jahres Plus this year—is for heavier games (you can read heavier as meaning longer rules, more bits, and a longer playing time). And it’s the latter category that has gaming enthusiasts interested.
My interest in the SdJ as an organizing principle for game day is twofold: the award was announced just a few weeks ago, and the people who have said they’re coming for game day may not be committed to, say, a four hour playing of Arkham Horror. Though they might. Cody, a colleague of mine, did want to know if anyone would be up for Risk. And he may well have some takers. But SdJ games tend to move quickly, even if the game itself is new and offers more intriguing rules than “role the dice, move your mice” (with apologies to MouseTrap—though who ever built the Rube Goldberg machine of that game to do anything but watch it run?).
I have my own strange relationship with the SdJ. When Wendy was born, a friend of mine, Stewart Woods, was going to Essen, Germany for the Essen Spiel (and that event will need a whole different essay to explore) and was willing to pick up that year’s SdJ winner, Keltis. This meant that he’d have to ship it back from Australia, and that, too, is a whole different essay. But I did get the game. And I’ve recently picked up the very first SdJ winner, Hase und Igel (Hare and Hedgehog), and I ordered a copy of this year’s winner, Dixit, before it had even been nominated for the award. So I have some of the winners, and I like them, so for this month, the SdJ it is.
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