Openers: Mark: Space Empires 4X Jonathan: 2005 Flashback & Quiz Closers: Jonathan: My top games of 2005 Mark: Hosting my own (small) event instead of traveling to a con?

Mark Johnson

@MarkEJohnson

Jonathan Takagi

@jtakagi

The Wayback Machine is back. One more time, a friend joins me to go back in time to an earlier Spiel des Jahres, looking at the winner but also the other nominees and recommended games. In addition, my guest helps me think about the earlier time itself, and how the games, the hobby, and the community may have changed over the years. This time it's my longtime friend & listener from San Diego, Jonathan Takagi. In fact, he's from a bit north, in Escondido, and Jonathan is another one of the people behind my favorite regional con, EsCon. I'll be going back there in a month! Jonathan decided to pick 2005 because it's twenty years ago...which also happens to be when I started the podcast. Niagara was the game that won the SdJ (one of my earliest disappointments with the jury's selection!), and I replayed it just recently to re-examine my opinion about the game. In fact, it can be played online at BGA, which seems odd for a game that relies on its physicality and "toy factor" as much as it does. Still, the actual strategy in the game remains intact in the format, since the unpredictability of the fork in the river may not be so unpredictable after all. What do you think of Niagara?

We don't just talk about the winner, though. Back in those days, the SdJ jury announced four other "nominated" games that could've won the award, and several more "recommended" games. For me, I think the game I'd want as the winner resides in the nominated list, while Jonathan singles out some standouts from the recommended list. Other titles nominated for the SdJ: Verflixxt! (That's Life), Around the World in 80 Days, Jambo, and Himalaya (Lords of Xidit)

Other titles recommended by the SdJ jury: Boomtown, Tanz der Hornochsen (Dance of Ibexes), The Gardens of the Alhambra, Diamant (Incan Gold), Geschenkt! (No Thanks), Piranha Pedro, Typo, and Wie ich die Welt sehe…

We also talk about two other major German game awards, the Deutscher Spielpreis, and the A La Carte. They are both ranked list. The former is (sort of) for heavier, gamer-games, while the latter is for card games (or “board”games done with cards). The timing of these awards is slightly off from the SdJ, so depending on publication dates a game might show up in one year’s list for one award, and the following year for another award. But they’re all close, and with some notable overlap for widely-respected games. DSP 1. Louis XIV 2. Niagara 3. Manila 4. Ubongo 5. Himalaya 6. Around the World in 80 Days 7. Shadows Over Camelot 8. Jambo 9. The Scepter of Zavandor 10. Verflixxt! A La Carte 1. Jambo 2. Geschenkt! 3. Wie ich die Welt sehe… 4. Diamant 5. Boomtown 6. Razzia! 7. Team Work 8. Gelb Gewinnt! Near the end of the episode, Jonathan considers what we can now observe in the hobby when we look back on 2005. Was it the start of a transition from “German Games” to the broader notion of “Euros”? Of course we had some French, Italian, British, and even American titles back then, but they’re hobby still showed its tremendous roots in German culture and its game publishing. At some point, that changed. Was this around the start of that change? -Mark

Opener: Join us to play games online together on May 3. We're meeting on the Discord server, as well as the Boardgames To Go Listeners group on BGA

I set out to give myself a break this month, just talking about some recent games and fielding a few questions sent to me. In fact, I've been doing so much gaming lately that I had to whittle my list down to just these six games to share my impressions about. Then the feedback questions ended up being more fun to dive into than I expected. These kinds of shows are fun & easy to do--I won't do them all the time, but every once in a while should be ok. Closer: Message me with any of your questions, and I may use them on a future Session Report & Feedback episode. -Mark

The annual voting/predicting competition called Mark Madness is now finished. The results are posted with the rest of the updates for episode 239, and here co-host Eryn Roston returns one last time to share the winners. Unconscious Mind was our collective favorite for game cover art, and Adam Brocker is this year's winner. The plan now is for Adam to help me run next year's Mark Madness, in 2026. Next, I share my time at Dice Tower West. This is the second year in a row that I've gone to this national boardgame convention. Is it national? I think so. It's certainly big. Held in Las Vegas every March, that's a destination I can reach by car. I join a bunch of friends there and we play most games together. Besides a number of fresh & new ones, the buddies I got to this con with enjoy focusing one entire day on old games. We define that as games more than 25 years old. Last year that went to 1999, and now we included other titles published in 2000.

-Mark

The Championship is now set!

https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/354557/mark-madness-2025-game-cover-art-with-eryn-roston

Be sure to go vote at https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/354557/mark-madness-2025-game-cover-art-with-eryn-roston?itemid=11634552#11634552

The round of 32 is finished, leaving us now voting on the Sweet 16 of game cover artworks. The choices are getting more difficult.

And we have a new leader in our prediction contest. #Davecember celebrity loofish is representing his namesakes with a currently-in-first-place position for his guess...but with others on his tail.

Eryn is back to talk with me about the results of the first round voting. Half of our original 64 game cover art entries have now been knocked out of the contest. Now successive voting rounds keep halving the remaining contestants every three days. What have we seen so far? No ties, though a couple matchups were close. A few more were blowouts. Are there common threads? Surprises? Plus...Eryn teaches me how to look at art more critically...by SQUINTING. Achievement unlocked.

-Mark

If you're playing along with Mark Madness this year, the time for predictions is over and you'd better start voting. Whether you've done a prediction or not, the link below takes you to the place where you can choose your favorite game cover art as 64 titles square off against each other in one-on-one matchups. 

https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/354557/mark-madness-2025-game-cover-art-with-eryn-roston

Mark Johnson

@MarkEJohnson

eryn roston

@baditude

Once again, the month of March give me a chance to bring back "Mark Madness," my podcast-hosted voting contest. Like its namesake sports tournament, Mark Madness is where 64 games are pitted against each other in successive rounds of single-elimination votes. As before, I took the winner of llast year's contest, Eryn Roston, and asked him to co-host this year's contest. Furthermore, Eryn has helped define the special nature of the contest this year. It's still about boardgames, of course, but it's about boardgame art. Specifically, we're voting on the best boardgame cover art. Eryn picked four groupings, each with 16 titles apiece. Those groupings are called Divisions, and this year there are ones for Fantasy, Historical/Real-World, Nature-themed, and Science Fiction boardgame covers. You will see some you know, and some others you don't. Just by looking at the images alone you can decide which ones to vote for, but you'll have more fun if you also listen to Eryn describe why he picked these particular game covers for Mark Madness. You see, Eryn works professionally in the world of art, went to school for it, and knows more than your average bear about artwork. If you're like me, you'll learn something along the way and appreciate game art (& artists) even more.

Play along! I hope we get a good number of folks who submit their own official predictions at challonge.com, which is free. Some have already done it. You've until March 12 to submit your brackets, so you need to move quickly. Then the voting rounds will start via Geeklist polling. As you can see from the chart above, the successive rounds of this voting will start happening every three days: On March 15 we'll have the results of the first round, when 64 teams are winnowed down to 32 survivors. Then it proceeds to the Sweet 16, Elite 8, Final 4, and Championship. Who will be the winner? We expect to do "micro-episode" podcasts throughout the month to talk about each round. They'll show up in your regular feed, and I can link them here, too. -Mark Fantasy Division geeklist

Historical/Real-World Division geeklist

Nature Division geeklist

Sci Fi Division geeklist

David Arnott

@Arnott

When did you start listening to podcasts? Do you remember your first ones? For me it was the first one ever about boardgames and the first about movies. That was Geekspeak and Reel Reviews. Even though I'm not so into wine, Grape Radio was another super early one for me. The medium was new, the tech was unfamiliar, and I loved the chance to listen to interesting audio on my commute, about unique subjects. Although those earliest shows seemed to use a lot of fancy, expensive equipment, I wondered if a more basic podcast could be produced with simple gear. On March 3, 2005, I threw my hat in the ring with Boardgames To Go, a new audio version of my blog of the same name. The response was quick & positive, so I kept at it. Two decades later, I'm still here. Twenty years is an important milestone for me. I never really saw myself doing the podcast this long. I've averaged about 18 episodes per year over that time, including some early bursts of productivity and a few longer gaps. After the pandemic I renewed my commitment to the podcast and have stuck with a first-of-the-month schedule ever since, plus some bonus episodes along the way. My audience grew, then plateaued, then settled into a longstanding core of listeners. It's no exaggeration to say that you folks are the reason I've kept at it. I appreciate [your appreciation & encouragement, and I've enjoyed meeting some of you in-person. This month you'll have to indulge me talking podcast history, motivation, and a little future planning. I can't help it. Longtime friend Dave Arnott talks through it with me, and we may not refer to a single game title! Don't worry--there will be more game titles than you can shake a stick at soon (hint: Mark Madness).

-Mark