And the Winner Is…!
By Marc Q
The title is funny because when I started writing this post back in June, the 2024 winner of the Spiel Des Jahres hadn’t been announced yet. But of course now we all know the winner is Sky Team!
There are hundreds of board game awards and all of them are (in my humble opinion) totally meaningless, except for the Spiel Des Jahres. Just to take a random example, Wits and Wagers has won more than 40 board game awards. And while it’s a great game (I’d argue that it’s one of the best trivia games ever), it’s certainly not as good as Just One as a party game, or even Codenames; despite the fact that neither of them have won a dozen awards. But they have won the Spiel des Jahres!
Simply put, the Spiel des Jahres just matters. It carries weight that other awards do not, and has a proven record of top-quality choices established over decades.
Interestingly, the Spiel des Jahres is awarded to the best family-style game released in Germany for the calendar year under consideration. Which means that games can win in years they weren’t released in North America (the aforementioned Codenames won in 2016, despite releasing in 2015)!
The award is usually focused towards family games that are quick to teach and play. What this means is you’re not going to find deeply complex or strategic games winning a Spiel des Jahres. Think of old winners like Carcassonne or Ticket to Ride: these aren’t necessarily going to explode your mind with revolutionary mechanics or be the most brilliant design of all time… but they will be consistently fun for everyone who sits down for a game.
It is rare for a Spiel des Jahres to be somebody’s favourite all-time game. But it’s almost unheard of for somebody to really dislike a winner. Think of them as solid, accessible, and approachable games. Fun for everyone!
There are of course exceptions. Pictures won the Spiel back in 2020, and while I think it’s a fun activity, it’s one of the few board games that I don’t think is a particularly strong board game. On the other end of the spectrum, I think Codenames is legitimately one of the greatest games ever made for six to twelve players, and not “just” a very, very good middle-of-the-road game. Considering the awards have been going since the late 70s, they’ve maintained an incredibly solid track record.
If you want to see a list of the Spiel award winners from previous years, we have a handy category on our website specifically to list award winners, and you can find it right here!
All of that said, it's worth mentioning 2024’s nominees! Captain Flip (by one of my favourite designers, Paulo Mori), the quirky two-player co-op game Sky Team, and In the Footsteps of Darwin.
As I mentioned above, the grand prize winner of Spiel des Jahres 2024 is Sky Team, and I’ll be the first to admit that I’m pleasantly surprised!! While cooperative games are well-represented in the previous Spiel winners, it is unusual for a 2-player exclusive game to win. That stated, Sky Team is very good, as long as you find stressful chaos hilarious. Turns out I absolutely do!
The other award of note is the Kennerspiel des Jahres (the “Advanced” or “Skilled” Game of the Year). And for 2024, Daybreak by veteran designer Matt Leacock (designer of Pandemic and one of the foundational designers of modern cooperative games) managed to take the prize. I don’t tend to pay a lot of attention to the Kennerspiel. Not because they’re bad games, but they tend to be a lot less consistent, and more of an indication of the current trends in gaming rather than potentially timeless classics. Again, there are exceptions: the sublime The Crew Quest for Planet Nine is a great game I recommend multiple times daily for its combination of collaborative, fun gameplay, gentle tutorial system, and rock-bottom price. As for Daybreak… I haven’t played it yet, but the reviews I’ve read have been very positive, and the theme is definitely one of contemporary importance.
So there you go! We now all know the winners of the 2024 Game of the Year!
Get out there and give them a shot!