Well, as many of you know – this is the time of year when people get crazy about tournament brackets. Today is one of the most anticipated days of the year for sportsfans when the NCAA Division 1 Basketball Brackets are announced. Here at the Opinionated Gamers, we’ve decided to have our own sort of tournament – trying to decide upon the best Spiel des Jahres!
The seeding committee is meeting this weekend, and we will unveil our bracket on this coming Monday and Tuesday. Of course, just like the NCAA tournament, it’s no longer a “perfect” bracket. We currently have 33 SdJ winners – which is one more than the ideal, but the tournament steering committee has decided upon a unique three-way battle to make things fit. This seems like a more elegant solution to the problem rather than have these extra “play-in” games, and by doing it in this manner, no one has to travel to Dayton.
So how will this work?
Simple – once the brackets are announced, we will have voting via the poll system built into the blog. Votes will be tabulated and the game with the most votes moves onto the next round. We will continue at a pace of one round per week.
Round of 33 – March 12-16
Round of 16 – March 19-25
Round of 8 – March 26-30
Final 4 – April 2-6
Finals – April 9-13
Who is in the tournament?
2011: Qwirkle (designed by Susan McKinley Ross, published by MindWare and Schmidt Spiele)
2010: Dixit (designed by Jean-Louis Roubira, published by Asmodée Editions)
2009: Dominion (designed by Donald X. Vaccarino, published by Rio Grande Games)
2008: Keltis (designed by Reiner Knizia)
2007: Zooloretto (designed by Michael Schacht)
2006: Thurn and Taxis (designed by Karen and Andreas Seyfarth)
2005: Niagara (designed by Thomas Liesching)
2004: Ticket to Ride (designed by Alan R. Moon)
2003: Alhambra (designed by Dirk Henn)
2002: Villa Paletti (designed by Bill Payne)
2001: Carcassonne (designed by Klaus-Jürgen Wrede)
2000: Torres (designed by Wolfgang Kramer and Michael Kiesling)
1999: Tikal (designed by Michael Kiesling and Wolfgang Kramer)
1998: Elfenland (designed by Alan R. Moon)
1997: Mississippi Queen (designed by Werner Hodel)
1996: El Grande (designed by Wolfgang Kramer and Richard Ulrich)
1995: The Settlers of Catan (designed by Klaus Teuber)
1994: Manhattan (designed by Andreas Seyfarth)
1993: Call My Bluff / Liar’s Dice (designed by Richard Borg)
1992: Um Reifenbreite (designed by Rob Bontenbal)
1991: Drunter und Druber (designed by Klaus Teuber)
1990: Adel Verpflichtet / Hoity Toity (designed by Klaus Teuber)
1989: Cafe International (designed by Rudi Hoffmann)
1988: Barbarossa (designed by Klaus Teuber)
1987: Auf Achse (designed by Wolfgang Kramer)
1986: Heimlich & Co. / Top Secret Spies (designed by Wolfgang Kramer)
1985: Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective (designed by Raymond Edwards, Suzanne Goldberg and Gary Grady)
1984: Railway Rivals (designed by David Watts)
1983: Scotland Yard (designed by Werner Schlegel, Dorothy Garrels, Fritz Ifland, Manfred Burggraf, Werner Scheerer and Wolf Hoermann)
1982: Enchanted Forest (designed by Alex Randolph and Michel Matschoss)
1981: Focus (designed by Sid Sackson)
1980: Rummikub (designed by Ephraim Hertzano)
1979: Hare and Tortoise (designed by David Parlett)
How are the first round match-ups decided?
The tournament seeding committee (well, the writers of the Opinionated Gamers) will be setting up the initial matchups – using a very secret and nebulous set of criteria. Those pairs will then be placed in the bracket. The first half of the bracket will be revealed tomorrow (Monday) and the other half on Tuesday.
The entire bracket will then be available for viewing on the blog.
What do I do now?
Well – nothing – just check back tomorrow for the matchups and the start of the first round of voting!
