The official list of nominees for the 2024 As d’Or – The jury has decided!

A tough task for the jury this year to decide between the games likely to receive a Golden Ace: many proposals were somewhere between initiate and expert, Child or Golden Ace. Without further ado, here is their verdict, and the list of nominees for the 2024 Golden Ace!

The nominees for the Golden Ace

In the footsteps of Darwin

The perfect edition of Sorry We Are French for this quite simple game, in which you will take the Beagle on a journey to study species. Become an expert in In Darwin’s Footsteps, and collect knowledge on certain types of animals, whether by species or continent.

Trio

No real surprise with this nomination, Trio is often unanimous. A game that combines memory, bluffing, and a 7-family mechanic, with a very low price and a flashy edition. You will try to form trios of cards of the same value, from your hand, the central board and the hand of an opponent. Will ___tail Games finally have their Golden Ace?

Perfect Words

Perfect Words is an idea association game that is played cooperatively and in two parts. Like crosswords, players will create sequences of words that describe a concept, then by association of ideas try to all write down the same word for each concept thus formed. Simple and addictive, Perfect Words is a game that sets the mood and will prove to you if necessary that people don’t think like you!

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The nominees for the Child Golden Ace

Morris the Dodo

Help Morris the Dodo hide his eggs at the bottom of the waterfall. Drag Morris down the waterfall and place his eggs in the hiding places if they are whole. If the eggs are broken, they will be a clue for the explorer who will get closer to the nest! Empty the nest before the explorer discovers it!

My adventure puzzle

My Adventure Puzzle nominated for the Golden Ace and it’s a whole range highlighted! This puzzle game revolution takes the opposite approach by beginning to unfold its message by undoing the pieces of said puzzle. Remove the pieces to discover pieces of narration in this gamebook with very fresh gameplay!

Super Meow

Introduce children to deckbuilding? This is the promise of Super Miaou. And it is his originality in the children’s section that opens the doors to nominations for him. A deckbuilding with super hero cats and a super evil mouse, the game is well calibrated in terms of time and gameplay, and the mechanics are very easy to learn.

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The nominees for the Initiated Gold Ace

Eila and the shine of the mountain

We believed a lot in Eila, but seeing it selected only confirms the brilliant potential of this game with bittersweet influences in the purest Ghibli style, and the jury was able to go beyond the childish visuals to discover a very gamer heart with an optimization of resources which could place him as a proto Robinson Crusoe. Superb game designed by the brilliant Jeffrey CCH from the Hong Kong studio Ice Makes.

Faraway

Superb edition for Faraway which can be played with 2 or 6 players, and in which we take a journey of 8 cards to score points. But be careful, after placing your 8th card, turn them over and reveal them, this time from right to left. Will you have respected the conditions for each card to score? Risk taking, prioritization and lots of subtleties with Faraway, a game not to be missed and which unsurprisingly appears among the nominees!

Cat in The Box

Cat in the box established itself upon its release as a marvelous UFO in the already oversaturated world of trick games. Bursting like the juggernaut who revolutionized style with this brilliant gimmick of choosing your color by playing it, he certainly had his place in this category.

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The nominees for the As d’Or Expert

The Family

To reproduce the great mafia war, there’s nothing like a 2×2 Eurogame! Here, we join forces to bring down the opposing families in a race for control of territories which will require developing intelligently on several axes thanks to a system of placing its workers in columns which trigger powerful actions. Clever and demanding.

The White Castle

In The White Castle, players attempt to gain influence for their family with Daimyo Sakai Tadakiyo. By placing courtiers, training samurai and working in the gardens, players must place their workers in dice-based gameplay. Le Château Blanc is a Euro-type game with mechanisms for resource management, worker placement and dice placement to carry out actions. During the game, over three rounds and 9 dice only, players will send members of their clan to maintain the gardens, defend the castle or progress in the social ladder of the nobility.

Darwin’s Journey

A marvel of worker pose and programming, it is very well themed what’s more. It’s undoubtedly one of those games where you understand what you’re doing when you put your character in a place, it’s strong, it’s beautiful, it’s good! It definitely has its place in this selection! If Darwin is popular this year, no duplicate with his formidable little brother (In the footsteps of Darwin). This Darwin’s journey had everything it needed to be named, starting with a strong theme, a mechanic elegantly linked to the theme and a never-before-seen twist: the specialization of its workers!

That concludes this selection of games nominated for the 2024 As d’Or! Huge surprises are to be noted, and even if the job of jury is impossible, I am preparing an article for you on the big losers of the 2024 Golden Ace! In any case, the successor to Akropolis is in terms of depth, whatever happens, a notch below!