The Spiel nominations were announced a few days ago.
You can read them here:
http://www.spiel-des-jahres.com/en/game_archive/2017The shortlist for Spiel is:
Kingdomino, Magic Maze & 'Race to El Dorado'
All three of these games look like strong competition for one another. I know Kingdomino has had more press coverage, but I'm not convinced it's ground-breaking. Magic Maze is a co-op which is going to count big. The mechanics look novel because all the players share the game's heroes and each player can only move heroes their particular way. It seems like a clever take on the escape mechanism. On the downside it is about robbing a shopping-mall; I hope thematically this would raise an eye-brow.
El Dorado is a Reiner Keniza and he's yet to win a SdJ. I'd not even heard of this but it looks to be quite solid.
There were some nominations that didn't make the shortlist. Of them, Klask get's my vote - Dan and I had a hilarious time playing this at Essen. So much so I ordered a copy from an online store so it was home before I was!
The Kennerspiel look tight too:
Terraforming Mars, Raiders of the North Sea & EXIT.
I've yet to play Raiders having backed it - I'll be wishing them luck - their KS delivery has been impeccable - I can't wait to get this to the table!
Linkback: https://www.carcassonnecentral.com/community/index.php?topic=3354.0