Spiel des Jahres 2026

I watched the BGG livestream of the Spiel des Jahres awards this past Sunday courtesy of Board Game Geek, which were translated in real-time in English, where appropriate. (Many of the award nominee designers and publishers spoke English as the common language, but the translations from German were most appreciated.) 

I really enjoyed Dr. Knizia’s speech on community, and how important it is for the German public to support not only the winners, but also all those that were nominated. My understanding is that a winner can have a serious bump (into the hundreds of thousands) in games sold after the award, and it sounds like Reiner Knizia wants to ‘spread the love’ a little bit to all of the other designers. (With upwards of 900 games designed, I can see why). 

Congrats to all of the winners of the Spiel awards:

Spiel: JinxO — a party game I hope to eventually try
Kennerspiel: Rebirth — Knizia has now been awarded all three trophies 
Kinderspiel: Mooki Island — love the cute artwork

I did very poorly on my guesses, missing on all three awards (I picked Cozy Stickerville, Moon Colony Bloodbath, and Verflixt Verzaubert.) Looking back on it, I still think that the JinxO choice is surprising, but the other two choices make sense. I’m sure that there was some sentimental thoughts for Dr. Knizia being the first designer to have been awarded a prize in all three categories. That’s one for the history books, for sure.

And seeing the video describing the game and its artwork, Mooki Island jumped up a little bit for me, too. I still support my guess of Moon Colony Bloodbath as the best game of all of those that were nominated, and next time, I won’t listen to Dave Dugas on his choices for the spiel. I’ll go with my own gut next time. 

Until next time, or until the next Spiel awards, laissez les bon temps rouler!
— BJ from Board Game Gumbo