At the time many gamers expected the mega-hit Puerto Rico to take home the prize, in spite of the fact that the SdJ had generally gone to family games in past. But I put it here mostly because of the impact its win had on the hobby.
I love the act of moving pillars from lower floors to higher ones, and it manages to stay accessible for people who have only ever played Jenga. It is the last pure dexterity game to take home the award, and it's one I find highly underrated. For most people Villa Paletti registers as something of a minor game. Let's start with the most unconventional choice on my list.
I mostly stuck with games with which I'm very familiar, with one semi-exception. I've played the majority of the winners, although many of the earlier winners are hard to find, or available only in German. And of course, it's about personal favorites too. For the purposes of this list, I'm going on the current visibility of the game, the impact it had on the hobby, and how well it has held up over the years. What do I mean by "greatest"? I admit that it's kind of a slippery term, but lots of these games are great for a lot of different reasons. But of those forty winners, which ones were the best? Which were the most important? Which ones are still fun to play today? After forty years, this seems like a good time to take inventory of the ten greatest games to win the Spiel des Jahres. The Spiel des Jahres became a mark of a good game. With the huge mainstream appeal of games like The Settlers of Catan, award-winners began carrying their award on the box lid. There are now forty games that have had the title of Game of the Year bestowed upon them by German-speaking board game critics, and the winner can expect to become one of the best-selling games in the world.Īlthough there were some international hits in the early days of the award, it was really in the 1990s that it became an international icon. Without much fanfare, 2018 marked the 40th edition of the Speil des Jahres.