What and where to get the hottest board games of Essen Spiel 2026

0:00 Hi everyone, it's Stella and that's Terren and welcome to our 2026 Essence Spiel anticipated board games where we will talk about games we have not played, we have researched and we are anticipating it and excited to play hopefully soon. We'll have two videos this video and games we recommend from Essence Spill 2026 which are the games we have played and would recommend for you mainly to buy but also to demo. But in this it's it should be available. Everything here that we're going to talk about it should be available for you to buy. We'll also mention the company and which booths you can get the games from Ashian. So basically you just like get your notepad ready and if you like what you hear and see just grab it, write it down. All right, Tara, we're going to talk about this in no particular order.

0:52 Yes. So the first one we have is uh60° C. Yes.

0:57 Which is much more uh

0:59 smoothly described as 60 below. Yes.

1:02 And this is by Alexander Fista and Peter Prince from Nanox Games and DLP games. You can find them at booth 3C115.

1:11 Yeah, maybe you can pre-order it. I'm not too sure. I don't actually get into that details, but this is Alexander Fist's new game. I don't remember him designing any games the last few years that stands out, and this seems to stand out. M yes, Antarctica is a theme that does appeal to me as a starting point. I find it a very interesting place. So that's uh cool to begin with.

1:36 Yes. So we are doing expedition to Antarctica and we've got some experts that place workers in certain areas and there are milestones to uh to score, but you score it not just at the end of the game, but towards the game. It's always good to have this milestones and scoring options and you can only score once. So, you're going to have to choose and then work towards it during a few rounds in the middle of the game.

2:05 Yes. It's got a a board with you'll be planning your actions each round. You're building up a map together

2:12 together. Yeah.

2:13 Yeah. Lots of uh thinking ahead and trying to

2:15 interaction as well.

2:16 The front.

2:17 Yes. So, - 60°. So again, a disclaimer, this is what we think we're going to like, but if you get it, you don't like it, please don't blame us.

2:28 Second on our list is Fishing Fishing 2 at Freedom and Frieza from 2FA. Check them out at booth 3G215. So this is a sequel to Fish, which was a game that both of us really enjoyed from a couple of years ago.

2:47 Trick- Taking game. trick taking game with a deck building a simple deck building element where the cards you take in the tricks are your are put into your personal deck from which you draw next round. Yes. So, when you win a lot of tricks, you're going to get everyone else's garbage cards into your deck, which means you're not going to win a lot of tricks for the next round. And over eight rounds of es and flows. It just becomes this can you be ahead at the end kind of thing,

3:15 which is which I every game is can you be ahead at the end, but this one is

3:19 do you have the right run to the finish? Kind of like a Kieran. Um I I associate it with like a Kieran cycling race.

3:29 What is that?

3:30 Uh people just go around behind a pace car, a pace bike for many many laps and then the bike goes in and it's just a twolap race to the finish. So you want to position yourself for that final.

3:44 Is that is this thing a sport or is it a

3:46 cycling? Veladrome cycling.

3:48 Okay. Oh okay. Yeah. Type of cycling.

3:50 Anyway, uh that's how fish work. That's how fishing two works, but it is a different deck now. It instead of being four suits, there's two suits. So, they're bigger suits and there will end up being two different trump colors come into play, but it al it will alternate which one of them is the trump in any given time. So,

4:14 yeah, it's

4:15 it is more of the same

4:17 uh same same but different.

4:20 How do you call it? It'll be it'll be all those sorts of things, but it'll be that same kind of fun eb and flow experience with some different tricks and twists to learn about.

4:29 I will hunt it down. I will fish it out of essence.

4:33 No puns intended.

4:34 Sounded like it was intended.

4:35 It was intended. I lied.

4:37 Busted.

4:39 Game number three is Greenwood. This is probably Ferland Spiel big release this year which you can get from booth 3 Q3000 designed by Christos Gana and Manolis Zakriadis. How is my pronunciation? I am sorry if I butchered it.

5:02 Sounded good to me.

5:02 Thank you.

5:03 Pretty good. All right.

5:04 Validation. So, uh, this is in this game you're kind of facing the druids who are putting the spirits into the world. It is a it is a game where you're uh you're gaining cards. They'll give you more actions. You are interacting with your opponents a little bit more than than in maybe a typical tableau builder. So you'll be able to activate your own cards, but then once it's been activated, one opponent will be able to use a spy to activate that as well.

5:35 That's so cool.

5:35 So you got to keep your eyes on what everyone else is doing to get the best combinations.

5:39 Sounds a bit like that avidel thing that you can use the red building or something in Everel. You can use other people's stuff. Anyways,

5:48 yeah. And you're also uh Tetrising up a little board. You get some of the points for building up a little Tetris board when you uh

5:54 the submarine. Yes. Yes. Yeah.

5:57 It's like that. So, yeah, sounds like some nice mechanisms in there. It's got a nice kind of uh Celtic druidic feel, which is always a nice vibe for a game.

6:08 And sometimes we do look at the companies as well because we've played a few of their games. We've been enjoying their games. Like, of course, the biggest one is probably, I might be wrong, Ark Nova.

6:20 Yeah, that's uh I've heard of that game. That's was a fairly fun.

6:25 You've heard of that game. You play that non-stop on board game arena. Taran,

6:28 that's true.

6:29 Yes. Okay. So, Greenwood is on our list. Game number four is Kingdom Come Deliverance. This is something that we've talked about previously that I've seen previewed at Gen Con this year. So, big designer names here. Flada Chhatil and Thomas Hollik.

6:49 Yes.

6:50 Get it from Czech Games Edition booth 7e 100. I swear that whole seven used to be nothing and then now it's just like a lot of

7:00 um a lot of booster now here including Asthmo D or maybe I'm I was wrong I don't know

7:05 but in anyway in any case do make your way over to Hall 7 Kingdom Come Deliverance. It is the big Czech games edition release for the year based on the video game. It is an an openw world sandboxy kind of game with a Euro engine kind of vibe.

7:24 Yes. So it's kind of like a bit of a a narration in there. You go adventuring and then you can I don't know steal horse horses and then the villagers would hate hate you. There's some consequences and you get to choose the quest as well which one you want to complete. And I think this is uh like a a big thing that you can replay again and again. So it's not like oh the story you play that one and that's it. Um because of the mechanics you can replay and replay again. So this is going to be check game's big release this year.

7:57 Yes.

7:58 Game number five is North Green by the game builders booth 4J500. We've been enjoying the game builders games.

8:08 Yes. This is by Thorston Hansen and Andreas Odendal, also known as Han and Oda.

8:14 Yeah.

8:15 And this game, I must say, if you

8:19 if you describe it

8:20 out loud, it sounds like an u Rosenberg game.

8:24 In fact, it sounds like Rayult because it is a farming game in it is a farming worker placement game set in Iceland. In fact, I think you're even producing many of the same things that you do in Rakeult.

8:36 Okay. Um, but it's I mean it's a different game.

8:39 There are many farming games. I'm not going to say that Rosenberg has a a monopoly on them or anything like that, but yeah, this is a worker placement game, competitive worker placement with a couple of shared spaces. You will be building up a tile placement map of your farm as you go along. And then you can plant crops, uh, produce animals, breed animals, and so forth. Uh, research, delivery. So yeah, lots of uh lots of building capabilities in there.

9:09 Seems like you build your farm, you need to plan ahead really in timely manner because what you build above it and above it then it will affect or it's a big part of strategy.

9:23 Yes. Because you'll be able to build on top of uh on top of your layers.

9:27 So it's like vertical farming then or something like that.

9:29 Yes.

9:30 Yeah. Go up. Is it like gutted in the sky?

9:33 It's not. I don't know if you'll get all the way to the sky, but uh certainly off the ground.

9:37 So, speaking about that landscape, it seems that it's heavily rely on the strategy of building it and what research you do and that's drive the main strategy. Hopefully, that's a good one. We've been enjoying it. So, it's good record of having um published great games. Game number six is Time Span by Allian Games with 3D200. I think this is a new uh p relatively new publisher which we got a recall from last year. Essence bill.

10:10 Yes, this is designed by Kenneth Mind and Christian Ammonson Erby. And this is a

10:16 civilization

10:17 civilization game. It is a it's a card drafting game at its core. That's the main uh interactive mechanism where there'll be sets of cards that you can draft and then from there you do most of your work independently. You'll move them into

10:32 and simultaneously.

10:33 Yes, you'll move it into something like a V counts of the West Kingdomy kind of uh card row where you'll move the cards along and they'll contribute while they're there and then once they're gone they'll just go into your scoring pile.

10:47 Yeah. So this action is in this like I think four cards in there and you can do it in action and there's some timing elements to it. When to push a card aside and get the endame scoring goal or when to keep it available for you to do the actions.

11:04 Yep. It's got all the kinds of things you normally have to worry about with a civilization game. You've got a limited pool of cubes that will uh

11:11 supplies

11:12 supply all of your resources. So you've got to manage that. that's kind of like, you know, um more tight than uh Through the Ages had, but it had that kind of thing going on. Uh you can also do a little bit of interaction with each other's

11:25 positive player. Yes.

11:27 So, I can use your wonder and you can and I get and you get points.

11:30 Points. Yeah.

11:32 That sounds good. So, we Well, we like recall even better than the previous iteration of it, which is

11:40 revive.

11:41 Thank you. Revive. I should have known like recall. will revive. So, time span is this year's released. So, check it out. Game number seven is Bunny Kingdom Town. So, it's been a while since Bunny Kingdom came out. This game is also designed by Richard Garfield and published by Yellow, which will be at booth 6F 200. Yes, this is a uh two-player designed I'm going to say spiritual successor to Bunny Kingdom. It is not a direct version of it, but it shares a lot of the same kinds of things. Bunny Kingdom, of course, had the big grid and you were drafting plots where you could put things as well as putting things there. In this one, you're still drafting plots on a smaller board, but there's a bigger element of drafting the right building tiles. So open draft I think rather than like pass on the draft. And I remember in Bunny Kingdom the drafting with two players variant you actually each time you gain something from a deck or something for the for the draft the for the two players one but this one is an open draft.

12:54 Yes. This still has some of the uh feel and elements of the original Money Kingdom where you're trying to make clusters of uh of tiles and get things adjacent in certain ways that they're going to score, but it has a different kind of vibe to it.

13:09 The idea is you want to be the best mayor of Bunny Kingdom Town and then earn the most golden carrots. So, featuring bunnies,

13:18 carrots, and fierce bunny. I thought bunny is peaceful. Um, obviously it's not always.

13:24 Yeah. Well, it was always a very uh for a game called Bunny Kingdom, it had the meanest bunny on the front of it.

13:30 That's probably probably bunny with um teeth.

13:34 Sharp pointy

13:35 sharp teeth. Yes. Game number eight is 1953 Everests. This is by Looping Games booth 3D511. Now looping games is famous I would for us anyway is well known to have some kind of like meat weight euro in a small box games.

13:58 Yes. Bundled up in a nice bit of uh of history as well. So that's right. Kicks a lot of things for me. This one is about the uh ascent to the summit of Everest in 1953.

14:10 Yes. And designed by Savia Verlo.

14:14 Yes.

14:14 Yes. Thank you. Uh so you will be ultimately you're trying to create a mountain-shaped tableau uh gaining cards from a common area and you have to try to make a path that will take you to the top

14:29 will give you oxygen in the right place. It's a race to the top. You're trying to complete your mountain first.

14:34 Uh but it's a it's a placement puzzle of trying to get resources in the right places to deal with the weather, deal with things that are going on. And it sounds quite intricate. I'll be very interested to see how this one uh links together and where the tension points are.

14:50 And the engine building as well. I think it's links with the cards as well. It's not only for engine buildings, resources, and also race. Like do you want to quickly go up there, but are you going to run out of oxygen and then die? Maybe not die. Hopefully not.

15:03 Hopefully not. Is there a mule there? Hopefully there's a mule that goes up. Like isn't that what happened in when you hike and then you can just hire that just mule you to the top or something? I think Everest is a little more difficult.

15:15 Okay. Whoops. Game number nine is Ash's Blackout Protocol. This is by Paralo Games. Booth 3 U115 designed by Choose or or Jesus Fuentes Eduardo Pav. Sorry, Jorge J. Per.

15:37 Yes, this is uh so by Peril Loco. It is very much an in universe successor to Phoenix New Horizons,

15:46 which we love. Yes.

15:48 And it looks like it has a fairly similar kind of uh similar kind of vibe to it. There is a an action selection board which has many linked spaces, linked actions you can take.

16:00 Oh, by the way, the team is I think it's postwar alternative postwar 1989 or something. And then there is a main board with areas and maps that you're going to be moving around trying to influence different areas at the right times for points and different colonies and things like that. So the original Phoenix had um it had areas that you were trying to collectively build into. So it had some interaction there and I'm hoping for much of the same from this.

16:31 Yes. And there's some mechanics about the colony that you that you rescue or the people that you rescue. It's a puzzle as well. So puzzle upon puzzles.

16:42 Last but not least game, The Dawn of Pangia.

16:46 Yes.

16:47 By Teresa 3 Q400.

16:52 And this is designed by Thomas Frankens. So this is a game where you'll be building up a shared map together. It looks like it's quite in the uh the entry to midlevel uh spatial puzzle kind of game.

17:06 Uh you will be yeah building planting seeds trying to grow trees collectively while you build up something that's worth as much as many points to you as you can. It's a bit of a special puzzle and I believe this is a reimplementation of a different game that was out previously and now it's a new reimplementation and it's got really cute threes by the looks of it.

17:29 Indeed. It reminds me of that game as well, the with the special puzzle with three for the synthesis, but this is probably well I would imagine this is a different sort of special puzzle and this is this has got more other mechanics. So probably not heavily on just the special puzzle but other things as well.

17:51 The guardians are really cute. those animals guardians that will give you power and I believe Tisha is a company from Switzerland Switzerland that is trying to use recycled material or ethically resourced material and things like that. There's a word for it FSC.

18:10 Yeah, good stuff.

18:11 Components wise looks amazing. So, we're looking forward to hopefully get it from Essence Spiel. And those are the 10 anticipated games. And please once again do not blame us if these games are not as good as it's we made it sounds because we haven't played as well. We've done our research but we haven't played it essentially.

18:30 And there's a game for everyone's tastes and your tastes may not match ours.

18:34 That's correct. And if you do have anticipated games that you want to share it with us, please let us know in the comments. I'll look it up. like the previous ones that we've done this kind of videos. Some people like, I want to see this, this, this, and then I will just put it in the list and or I just research it and it might be on my list again. So, thank you so much for watching. If you go to Essence Spiel 2026, please say hello if you see me. Although I'm running around like doing appointments or getting lost, I might ask you where to go. But until there, thank you for watching. Have a good day. Bye.