After spending summer traveling or enjoying the nice weather outside, fall’s plunging temperatures offer the perfect excuse to stay indoors and play some games. But beyond a packed release schedule for video games, fall is a huge time for board games, with many new titles previewing and releasing at Germany’s SPIEL Essen in October.
Even if you can’t make it to the world’s largest board game fair, there are highly successful crowdfunded games finally getting their retail release, and a tie-in to Dune: Part Three to look forward to. Whether you want something casual to play with the family or a deeply complex game that will take all day to complete, these are the 10 most anticipated board games releasing this fall, ordered by estimated release date.
The designers of the epic dark fantasy game Oathsworn return with an Arthurian area control game that raised $2 million on Gamefound. Two to four players control asymmetric factions exploring the isle of Avalon, searching for artifacts and mythical beasts. You can recruit powerful allies to join your cause, build settlements, hunt for the holy grail, and try to complete prophecies that could make you the next wielder of Excalibur. The art and miniatures are impressively detailed and serious fans can splurge on upgraded components or a fey-focused expansion.
Caylus and House of Cats designer William Attia created this rich worker-placement game focused on a border town that adventurers visit to pick up quests and boast about their achievements. Over the course of five rounds, each representing a year, you’ll be able to recruit companions, pick up equipment like weapons and potions, improve your strength and magical abilities, and share stories of your heroic deeds as you compete to become the most revered figure in town. It sounds perfect for players who want a fresh spin on Dungeons & Dragons, incorporating classic challenges like fighting bandits, demons, and necromancers.
Perfect for all ages, Marceline Leiman’s goofy game for two to six players takes just 20 minutes to play and is small enough to bring anywhere. Draft cards to support the dinosaurs you think will win or place in the race, and then flip cards to guide them down the track. You’ll earn more points if you can actually get an underdog across the finish line. Cards can send a dinosaur back to the last checkpoint or make it swap places with another racer, meaning the competition can change quickly right up until the end. The rules are easy to learn, and the short playtime means you can complete a few games back-to-back to really get the hang of it and give everyone a chance to pick a winner.
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Perfect for fans of Carnival Row, Prague Unseen is set in a fantasy version of 19th-century Prague populated by golems, vodniki, and gargoyles. Each faction has its own objectives, and as a city leader you’ll want to manage them all to grow your influence. That means carefully deploying your workers to rebuild bridges, improve your relationships with guilds, collect magic items, and gather rumors. The sheer number of strategies from the various faction minigames combined with the rich flavor makes Prague Unseen look like a game worthy of numerous playthroughs.
Fight back against the climate crisis in Sebastian Bleasdale’s game about naturalists helping rebuild animal habitats. One to four players compete by laying tiles representing different terrain types like wetlands, savanna, and deserts, and then reintroducing native species. Every choice changes how effective future actions are, and you’ll have to consider what creatures you want to focus on to suit your strategy and build a balanced ecosystem. Each player has their own hidden goals and public objectives to vie for, so the key to victory changes every game.
The third standalone game in Kosch’s Forest Shuffle series takes players to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park on the border of North Carolina and Tennessee. The relaxing game will let you learn a bit about the area’s flora and fauna as you craft a riverside forest and fill it with creatures like herons, bass, and otters, each with their own habitat preferences. The emphasis on water and new species changes up the mechanics and adds fresh synergies to be aware of as you choose between cards that offer instant bonuses and ones that will improve your forest for the rest of the game.
4 Queen Alice
Release date: Oct. 22
After raising more than $350,000 on Gamefound, the chess-based game from David Heras and Hector Carrion will be available to purchase for the first time at Essen. Alice is going to become queen of Wonderland, and you need to prepare her coronation banquet to prove you deserve to become her most trusted advisor. That involves persuading various chess pieces to help you out, acting strategically to unlock more powerful actions each turn. Queen Alice has the whimsical art you’d expect from a game based on Lewis Carroll’s strange world, but it requires paying serious attention to your opponents’ schemes.
Strategy games can take a long time, but Geoff Engelstein and Stephen Buonocore's asymmetric board game based on The Lord of the Rings mitigates that issue by having everyone take their turns at the same time. Two to four players control different armies fighting across Middle-earth, trying to predict what their neighbors will do to better manage resources while avoiding being outflanked. Players can unlock powerful allies like Gandalf or the Witch-king as they seek to destroy the One Ring or corrupt the Fellowship.
Gloomhaven is one of the most popular dungeon-crawler board games, but its long playtime and complex, unforgiving rules can make it hard to get into. Dennis Vogele’s Mercenaries Wanted will offer a more approachable entry to the world of Casskia, or a quick way for fans to play when they don’t have time to unpack a big box. The card-drafting game lets up to six players compete to recruit the most promising mercenaries they can find, equip them, and send them out on missions. You’ll race to see who can complete the most jobs to prove yourselves capable of protecting the city of Gloomhaven.
1 Dune: Imperium – Conspiracy
Release date: December
Paul Dennen’s Dune: Imperium series has earned a fanatical following with its highly strategic and flavorful gameplay. The last two games, Dune: Imperium - Uprising and Dune: Imperium - Bloodlines,were tied to Denis Villeneuve’s Dune films, and Dune: Imperium - Conspiracy is expected to release around the same time as Dune: Part Three. The new game will add an overthrow mode where one player takes on the role of the emperor and competes against two or three opponents. It also spices up the regular free-for-all gameplay with new leaders and imperial edicts that can force you to change tactics.
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