German-style Board Game - History

History

Contemporary examples of modern German-style board games referred to as German-style, such as Acquire, appeared in the 1960s. The recent genre as a more concentrated design movement began in the late 1970s and early 1980s in Germany. Today, Germany publishes more board games than any other country per capita. The phenomenon has spread to other European countries such as France, the Netherlands, and Sweden. While many games are published and played in other markets such as the United States and the United Kingdom, they occupy a niche status there.

The Settlers of Catan, first published in 1995, paved the way for the genre in the United States and outside Europe. It was neither the first "German game" nor the first such game to find an audience outside Germany, but it became much more popular than any of its predecessors. It quickly sold millions of copies in Germany, and in the process brought money and attention to the genre as a whole. Other games in the genre to achieve widespread popularity include Carcassonne, Puerto Rico, Ticket to Ride, and Alhambra.

Read more about this topic:  German-style Board Game

Famous quotes containing the word history:

    ... in America ... children are instructed in the virtues of the system they live under, as though history had achieved a happy ending in American civics.
    Mary McCarthy (1912–1989)

    It’s nice to be a part of history but people should get it right. I may not be perfect, but I’m bloody close.
    John Lydon (formerly Johnny Rotten)

    All history attests that man has subjected woman to his will, used her as a means to promote his selfish gratification, to minister to his sensual pleasures, to be instrumental in promoting his comfort; but never has he desired to elevate her to that rank she was created to fill. He has done all he could to debase and enslave her mind; and now he looks triumphantly on the ruin he has wrought, and say, the being he has thus deeply injured is his inferior.
    Sarah M. Grimke (1792–1873)