There is a Press Event the day before the game fair opens. Publishers large and small display their games to an eager crowd of journalists. 800 new games made their debut at Essen. Here's a small sample of the hundreds of games released this year.

Andreas discusses two new releases that draw their inspiration from Asia. From China, we have Qin, an abstract strategy game from Reiner Knizia. And from Japan we have Yedo, a worker placement game set in the early years of the Tokugawa Shogunate.

Michaela Magin chats about three new titles from Ravensburger: one for children (Wettstreit im Hexenwald), one for gamers (Saint Malo), and one for parties (Make 'n Break: Party).

Jaime Vega and Diego Martin discuss Gen X Games' latest release: Northwest Passage Adventure. Use your ship and your wits to discover the Northwest Passage before other Arctic explorers.

The European Society of Board Game Collectors is an organization devoted to spreading their love of games far and wide. Each year the group selects a theme and creates an exhibit to showcase the many different games that reflect this theme in some way.

Scott Alden ("Aldie") gives us a behind the scenes tour of the technology used to provide Boardgamegeek's live streaming coverage at Essen.

Designer Tony Cimino from Mage Company walks us through the basics of Wrong Chemistry, a fast, fun game of molecular manipulation. Players move tiles and pieces to create basic chemical elements.

Tabletop Producer Boyan Radakovich chats about plans for Season 2 and his plans for an international game day coming in 2013.

Didier Delhez talks about the new worldwide edition of Plato Magazine. Plato covers the world of board games from a truly international perspective, including interviews, reviews and features stories with designers, artists and publishers in the industry.

Designer Filip Neduk talks about Goblins, Inc. a new game from Czech Games Edition. Teams of goblins scramble to build giant robots battling to become the next big Boss.