Spiel des Jahres is Colt Express.
Kennerspiel des Jahres is Broom Service.
A bit of a slow year in my opinion. I haven't played either winner yet but reviews indicate they are good games. It's just that the competition seemed underwhelming.
Patchwork would have been a solid candidate but was hampared by being a two player. Nothing else stands out as a must have to me.
What do you think?
It's always interesting to see the difference in games that get nominated and win the Spiel des Jahres and those that get a lot of buzz in the sort of hobbyist communities that I get most of my news from. I had heard a lot about Machi Koro, which lost, but I know virtually nothing about Colt Express. And I don't know Broom Service, either, even though the Kennerspiel des Jahres caters much more towards the hobbyist community. I'll have to check these out at some point.
On one hand I see why Machi Koro gets a lot of attention, on the other I don't get it at all. The rules are pretty straightforward, there are a lot of choices and basic strategies are clear from the start, the art is cute... ...the rules are too confusing considering how simple the game is, the choices all seem pretty much the same, the way the dice work precludes any strategy other than maximizing dice roll coverage and the cards are look pretty much the same as they use only a handful of colors in the illustrations. But yeah, sometimes the jury comes up with completely overlooked titles. They play trough a lot of games after all.