Essen Spiel 2022: Report of the first day of the fair

Essen SpielEurope’s largest boardgames fair, is back with great fanfare with this lavish 2022 edition.

With 6 pavilions open to the public, over 1200 new releases presented at the fair (between games and expansions) and hundreds of exhibitors from all over the world, the Spiel seems to have left behind all the difficulties related to the covid that have characterized the last editions. We obviously couldn’t miss it: let’s find out together what we felt.

Orichalcum

Orichalcum is a draft and tile-placing game by Bruno Cathala and Johannes Goupy, published by Pandasaurus Games.

Set in mythological greece, the goal of each player is to develop their island by exploring its territories, building buildings, recruiting opilites, fighting monsters and above all by producing theorichalcumthe resource that will be the key to victory.

In the “Street market”In the center of the table we find the action cards, each of which has a territory-tile above it, and possibly a monster (in case a territory of the tile is a volcano). In the first phase of the turn each player must then select a combination of these three elements, placing the tile on his board, the monster on the desert and performing the action indicated on the card (which mainly allows you to produce, build, or fight monsters) . He will then have the option to perform an additional action, paying the cost.

The game is simple, affordable by everyone, it has proven itself to be solid and satisfyingdefinitely a title to recommend for its category.

Runar

At Ludus Magnus Studio we tried Runar, which will launch soon on Kickstarter. It is a skirmish title in which we will guide three characters trying to get points by attacking other players and collecting resources on the game map. Each player in his turn has the opportunity to activate a single character by playing the relative card, also obtaining the cubes marked on the latter. These cubes are usable to perform actions (attack, movement, and defense) during the activation phase.

As is often the case with Ludus Magnus Studio games, Runar’s materials and miniatures have them positively impressed, while the game mechanics we had the impression of scratching only the surface. Our demonstration was limited to the basic dynamics and the game proved to be perhaps a bit too simple, but for a definitive judgment we are waiting to try the full version (and above all the scenario campaign).

Lacrimosa

In the Devir booth we try Lacrimosaa game by Gerard Ascensi and Ferran Renalias in which, as patrons of eighteenth-century music, we will have to complete Mozart’s Requiem after the composer’s death.

The game is based on the cards, which they have two different functions, each represented in one half (upper and lower). At each turn we will select two cards from our hand, inserting them in the appropriate slots of our board so that the upper half of one card and the lower half of the other are visible.

The action indicated in the upper half must be done immediatelywhile the lower half is an annuity that we can collect at the end of the game turn.

The actions allow you to travel to the places where Mozart lived, to hire new composers and above all to finish his requiem, which was left incomplete. Lacrimosa it’s a complex title, it reminded us a lot Newton for the management of the cards and for its dynamics of deckbuilding and movement on the map. We found the title for sure Interestingto be explored with a complete game and in a more peaceful context.

Our first day in Essen ends here, but in the next few days many other news await us to try, so keep following us on all our channels, not to miss our next reports!