mkmagius01 wrote:

The only peculiarity I see of the nominees are Kennerspiel ones. When reading the rules for QofQ and Clever, I thought they seemed light compared to past Kennerspiel nominees. I didn't find them any more complex than Azul. On the other hand when people were predicting Heaven & Ale in the weeks prior I kept thinking it was too complex for a nomination. The bgg weight ratings somewhat agree with me. QofQ (which doesn't have many ratings) and Clever are currently the lowest weight games to be nominated by Kennerspiel and while H&A is within the range of past nominees is on the high end of the scale.



Maybe there weren't many good games between those 3?

Quote:

Unfortunately, we are increasingly under the impression that ever more very good games are being hastily put together at the last minute in order to meet release deadlines, without sufficient attention being paid to the comprehensibility and completeness of their rulebooks. We have never had to rule out so many in and of themselves very good games as this year, simply because their rulebooks did not meet the quality we expect. We jury members no longer wish to see ourselves in the role of beta-testers for rulebooks, which are only made adequate on the second printing run.

Quote:

What most annoyed us this year, however, was rulebooks which were full of mistakes, and which lacked any careful editorial revision. Especially with international publishers, sometimes misleading and incomplete translations led to helplessness and a shrugging of shoulders around the gaming table. Only adults experienced in playing games were able to play correctly purely by intuition. That's why certain extraordinary and stunning game concepts, and ones children really enjoyed, haven't made it onto our recommendation lists. That's an incredible shame, sometimes these shortcomings were evident even after the first play. We're wondering where this comes from. Are the publishers or the German distributors really under such high pressure that new releases have to be rushed out onto the market in such haste?

Ganz's score sheet — intuitive enough for everyone?

Quote:

Red [i.e., Spiel] marks games for everyone, especially people who have little experience with games. Even this group will have little difficulty getting to grips with these games. The charcoal-grey category [i.e., Kennerspiel] is for those players who have a little more experience in learning and applying tactical thinking to rules systems.

Quote:

Santorini we recommend as a purely two-player game. With Facecards we've managed to get a small, relaxed party game onto the list. Woodlands appeals to a logical sense of spatial awareness. Memoarrr! requires a good memory, 5-Minute-Dungeon is co-operative teamwork under time pressure and Majesty is a classic improvement game. In the more challenging arena there is a deck-building game in the fantasy genre (Clank!) and a strategic Western adventure (Pioneers).