{"id":6385,"date":"2026-04-06T14:42:38","date_gmt":"2026-04-06T13:42:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/boardgamewire.com\/?p=6385"},"modified":"2026-04-07T15:15:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-07T14:15:10","slug":"german-mensa-unveils-full-slate-of-nominees-for-this-years-mind-spielepreis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/boardgamewire.com\/index.php\/2026\/04\/06\/german-mensa-unveils-full-slate-of-nominees-for-this-years-mind-spielepreis\/","title":{"rendered":"German Mensa unveils full slate of nominees for this year’s MinD Spielepreis"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The German branch of high IQ society Mensa has unveiled its full slate of nominees for this year’s MinD Spielepreis<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mensa in Deutschland<\/a>\u00a0has run the awards contest\u00a0since 2009, and has operated a \u2018shorter games\u2019 category for more than a decade and lighter two-player games prize since 2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This year’s \u2018shorter games\u2019 category will be fought over by titles including 2025 Spiel des Jahres nominee Krakel Orakel<\/a>, as well as Gr\u00e9gory Grard and Mathieu Roussel’s design Zenith<\/a> and Take Time<\/a> from Alexi Piovesan and Julien Prothi\u00e8re.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Word chaining game Next<\/a> by Verena Wiechens and Lukas Setzke is also up for the shorter game prize – which focuses on titles that play in well under an hour – as is Mald\u00f3n’s design El Camarero<\/a> (published in Germany as Chaosteria), and Wilmot’s Warehouse<\/a> from David King, Ricky Haggett and Richard Hogg.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the two-player games category, Bruno Cathala’s design Kamon<\/a> is up against Niwashi<\/a>, from Gautier de Cottreau and Baptiste Laurent, Junghee Choi’s Orapa<\/a> and Tobias Tesar’s Perfect Murder<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Playball<\/a>, designed by David Florsch, will also compete in that category, as will Strategeti<\/a> by Ignasi Ferr\u00e9 and Suna Valo<\/a>, designed by Andreas Odendahl (who goes by ode.).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mensa Deutschland revealed in January that it was changing up the ‘complex games’ category of the awards<\/a> to focus entirely on expert-level titles, in order to fill what the organisers saw as a gap in the industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jochen Tierbach, who has been organising the MinD Game Award for 16 years, said at the time, \u201cThere are already various awards and prizes for family and connoisseur games.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBut for expert games, the really tough ones, there is no such thing in Germany yet. And we feel that the industry wants it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The long list of more than 20 expert-level titles was whittled down to six challengers for the complex games award this year:\u00a0Galactic Cruise<\/a>,\u00a0Luthier<\/a>,\u00a0Shackleton Base<\/a>,\u00a0Speakeasy<\/a>,\u00a0Thebai<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Thesauros<\/a>, all of which have been released in Germany since Spiel Essen last October.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last year\u2019s MinD award for complex games saw Tom\u00e1\u0161 Holek\u2019s space exploration eurogame SETI<\/a> add to its array of prizes, while Simone Luciani and D\u00e1vid Turczi\u2019s Nucleum triumphed in 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The most recent holder of the MinD shorter game award was 2025 Spiel des Jahres winner Bomb Busters<\/a>, while 2024 SdJ champion Sky Team<\/a> was last year\u2019s winner of the best two-player game prize.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For more stories like this direct to your email inbox, click here to sign up for BoardGameWire’s free email newsletter. \n\nAnd if you’ve found our reporting interesting or useful, please consider a paid subscription to help support our journalism!<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Mensa in Deutschland\u00a0has run the awards contest\u00a0since 2009, and has operated a \u2018shorter games\u2019 category for more than a decade and lighter two-player games prize since 2019.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6392,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[2093,16,17,6,135,2052,113,1700,2053,51,2085,2086,2087,2181,2255,2065],"class_list":["post-6385","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-2093","tag-award","tag-awards","tag-board-game","tag-board-games","tag-galactic-cruise","tag-germany","tag-krakel-orakel","tag-luthier","tag-mensa","tag-mind","tag-mind-spielepreis","tag-shackleton-base","tag-take-time","tag-wilmots-warehouse","tag-zenith"],"blocksy_meta":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t