Ants, the debut release from designers Renato Ciervo and Andrea Robbiani, has scored its first board game award by picking up this year’s Jogo do Ano, the Portuguese game of the year prize.
Vital Lacerda design Speakeasy, Dave Beck and Abe Burson’s Luthier and Toni López creation Ada’s Dream were also nominated for the annual prize, which is organised by the non-profit board game association Spiel Portugal.
The Jogo do Ano, which has been presented since 2006, tends to skew towards the heavier end of board gaming, with recent winners including SETI, Nucleum, Barrage and Imperial Struggle.
Spiel Portugal says the type of game it looks for is “strong, spirited, dense, and stimulating”. Each member of the organisation initially selects ten games, with the resulting five finalists played again and scored according to a weighted set of criteria.
Half of the final score is based on what Spiel Portugal calls “time/fun”, with production accounting for 15%, theme, mechanics and replayability each worth 10%, and player interaction making up the remaining 5%.
Ants, designed by Renato Ciervo and Andrea Robbiani
The title was originally published by Italy-based Cranio Creations, and has since been picked up for localisation by publishers including US-based Capstone Games and Germany’s PD-Verlag.
Ants is the sole design to date from chemist Renato Ciervo, who also works with Italian publishers as a game developer, according to his BoardGameGeek page.
His Ants co-designer, engineer Andrea Robbiani, has subsequently created Maestro – themed around the fierce rivalry between Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo – and co-designed Timeless Journeys: The Italian Grand Tour with Nestore Mangone.
Three-year-old Dutch board game publisher DSV Games has continued its rapid rise by securing three nominations in this year’s Dutch game of the year awards, a year after picking up its first win in the contest.
DSV has landed a nomination in each of the three Nederlandse Spellenprijs categories with Reiner Knizia design Rebirth, Tomáš Holek’s Pondscape and Ants from Renato Ciervo and Andrea Robbiani – equalling veteran Dutch publisher White Goblin Games and industry giant Asmodee as the most-nominated company this year.
The entirety of this year’s nominations are split between those three publishers, with White Goblin selected for Grégory Grard and Mathieu Roussel’s design Castle Combo in the Family category, and Keith Piggott-created River of Gold and Hisashi Hayashi’s Yokohama among the Expert games.
The remaining nominations are from Asmodee studios: Alexi Piovesan and Julien Prothière’s Take Time from Libellud in Family, and Space Cowboys’ Dewan (Johannes Goupy, Yoann Levet) and Office Dog’s two The Lord of the Rings: Trick-Taking Game releases (Bryan Bornmueller), which were judged as a single title, completing the Connoisseurs’ game shortlist.
The result sees DSV and Asmodee join White Goblin and fellow Dutch board game publishing veteran 999 Games as the only publishers to score at least three nominations in a single year since the Nederlandse Spellenprijs moved to its current three-category format in 2020.
999 Games was the only company to secure two nominations last year, and ultimately won both categories it contested, with Hisashi Hayashi design Bomb Busters taking the Family award and Botanicus (Samuele Tabellini Ferrari, Vieri Masseini) triumphing among the Connoisseurs games. DSV won the remaining Expert award with Tomáš Holek’s SETI.
This year 999 Games has no nominees at all – a not unprecedented situation, with the publisher also having missed the shortlist in 2021, but one that marks a sharp turnaround from its five nominations across 2024 and 2025. They included Sky Team winning the Family award two years ago.
DSV Games was launched in 2023 by online shop De Spelletjes Vrienden, with a focus on visually appealing titles which offer exceptional gameplay – making use of “stunning artwork, high-quality components, and well-crafted mechanics”, according to its website.
Its debut release slate in 2024 comprised four games including Rats of Wistar, designed by Simone Luciani and Danilo Sabia, which secured the publisher its first Nederlandse Spellenprijs nomination. The publisher increased its output to nine releases in 2025, and put out another 11 releases between January and the end of June this year – the cut-off point for games eligible for the 2026 award.
DSV co-owner Marieke Kuit-van Woesik said after the Nederlandse Spellenprijs victory last year, “We are really proud that as a publisher, which has only been around for two years, we receive this wonderful confirmation that we are on the right track with our small team.”
DSV Games co-owner Marieke Kuit – van Woesik collects the Nederlandse Spellenprijs Expert Game award for SETI in 2025
This year’s nominations take DSV into territory previously reached under the current award system only by two of the most established names in Dutch-language board game publishing.
The Nederlandse Spellenprijs added its intermediate ‘Connoisseurs’ category in 2020, creating the current annual line-up of three nominees apiece across Family, Connoisseurs and Expert games.
999 Games took five of those nine nominations in 2020, with White Goblin taking three. White Goblin followed with four nominations in 2021, while 999 again reached three in 2024. No other publishers bar those had scored three nominations in one year under the current format prior to 2026.
More than 100 board and card games released for the Dutch market during this year’s eligibility period were played by the Nederlandse Spellenprijs jury, which selects its nominees with a focus on quality, playability and originality.
The winners of the Family, Connoisseurs and Expert categories are due to be announced on October 10 at BumbleBeez Spellenwinkel in Bergen op Zoom.
Nederlandse Spellenprijs nominees2026
Family Castle Combo – designed by Grégory Grard and Mathieu Roussel (Published by White Goblin Games) Rebirth – Reiner Knizia (DSV Games) Take Time – Alexi Piovesan and Julien Prothière (Libellud / Asmodee)
Connoisseurs Dewan – Johannes Goupy and Yoann Levet (Space Cowboys / Asmodee) Pondscape – designed by Tomáš Holek (Published by DSV Games) The Lord of the Rings: Trick-Taking Game (Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers) – designed by Bryan Bornmueller (Office Dog / Asmodee)
Experts Ants – Renato Ciervo and Andrea Robbiani (DSV Games) River of Gold – Keith Piggott (White Goblin Games) Yokohama – (White Goblin Games)
As part of my piece meal approach to learning Module 4, I set out a solitaire game using M4’s Solitaire Political Assembly & Contracts. (I originally started to add the new colonists deck, augmentations and the exodus stuff, but then changed my mind). I did in fact play an earlier game with just the Solitaire Political Assembly, and I quite liked that.
My last few solo games had used the “You only see half of each patent deck” and “You start with a faction privilege, but don’t get home Bernal income until you have both a Bernal and a Factory” variants, and I rather liked that, but you could get hosed with some wildly inappropriate die rolls (and patent decks), so I’m using the Mod4 “You start with full patent decks” but keeping the faction privilege. I’m not playing any particular Solitaire game … I’ll just score normally.
I get ROSCOSMOS as the unit, so I start with delegates in Authority and Centrism. Authority is nice (with Regime Change1), because you can lobby when it’s inactive and the spent delegate counts for both lobbying and Regime Change. So you can cancel a budget cut/flare/pad explosion AND cycle the patents, or keep a really juicy patent on top. Yes, you spend time fundraising, but it’s a good trade.
Fig 1 — My Initial Offering
T1.1 (Solar Cycle.Year) — The Initial Patent Deck is … to put it mildly … not great. I fundraise (10 Aq) and put a delegate into Equality and (since it’s tied) make Research Grants2 the active law. Research Grants is quite powerful. I’ve already run a solitaire game (using just the M4 solitaire assembly) and between Research Grants and Regime Change I was able to do quite a bit more3 than I usually do in a 7-Cycle Game. (Some decent early patents and claim rolls also helped).
T1.2 — I roll the anarchy event and so I lobby to invoke Regime Change (9 Aq and lose the Authority Delegate) and let’s see what other patents are available…
Fig 2 — Take Two
These are also not great, but a smidge of a plan is starting to take hold. Since Research Grants are still active I take the Pulsed Inductive Thruster and Radio Isotope Stirling Generator (for free).
T1.3 There are now the Hall Effect Thruster and Flywheel Compulsator cards on top of their decks. I take those, too.
T1.4 Budget cuts, and I can’t over-ride it. Oh well, goodbye Radio Isotope Stirling. But that also means that the contracts haven’t rotated. I fundraise and put a delegate into Individuality (10Aqua) and make Launch Contracts the active law. Not because I love it (Boosting as a free action instead of an operation is … OK), but because that lets me take the “Hubris” contract. I get 8 more aqua but have to deliver some guy and let him be the first to set foot on a site in an unexplored region4.
T1.5 Boosting is a free action, but it still costs 8 Aqua to boost the trillionaire, Pulsed Inductive thruster and Flywheel Compulsator into LEO, load up six fuel tanks (so I’m down to 4 Aqua) and send the rocket from LEO to the cycler. (My stuff could make it through the radiation belt, but the trillionaire might not, so I’ll use the crew thruster next turn). I still have an action, so Fundraise to a) put a delegate in Authority and b) switch the law back to Research Grants (and get an aqua, so 5 Aqua).
Fig 3 — First Rocket (Pre Boost)
T1.6 — The event is Budget Cuts, so spend an aqua (4Aq) and lobby Regime Change to switch that to Inspiration.
Fig 4 — Now the Solar Sail Shows Up!
That Solar Sail would have been lovely a turn or two earlier (although the Trillionaire has 2 mass, so maybe not). I move the rocket into the rad belt (with the crew thruster, so that no roll can hurt my cargo/client). Since I have the Flywheel, that Robonaut and Refinery are both useful. Sure, neither is great, but Beggars can’t be Spacemen. I take the Neutral Beam + Optoelectrick Nuclear Battery.
T1.7 — Rocket take the red path (stopping at the Hohman). I don’t really want a solar flare, so I fundraise back into Authority. (5Aq). (I’m beginning to think that Regime Change is too good, maybe it should just cancel an inspiration or add inspiration to the existing event … not cancel it as well. How do you Regime Change a Coronal Mass Ejection?)5
T1.8 — The event is Pad Explosion, so … nothing. The rocket reaches Deimos, so I drop off the trillionaire (you’d think he’d want a return trip), grab the glory chit. I take the Froth Filtration refinery + the In-core Thermionic Generator (which was revealed after T1.6).
T1.9 — The rocket starts the return trip and I sell the In-core … (8Aq)
T1.10 — Inspiration roll, and I sell the Optoelectrick Nuke (11 Aq). Rocket still heads back.
T1.11 — I boost the Robonaut and Refinery (6Aq) as the Rocket returns to LEO, and I get a ticker tape parade.
T1.12 — I fuel up the new rocket (-5 Aqua, leaving 1Aq)6 and send it out to (where else?) Hertha.
Fig 5 — Off to Hertha
Yes, it’s heavy (and I’ll need to use the crew thruster to land). Yes, if I don’t bust Hertha7I’ll have to deconstruct every thing and re-boost. But perhaps there will be better patents available by then.
I take the Monatomic Plug Nozzle thruster and D-T Fusion Tokamok reactor. Man those research grants have saved me a ton of money. (If I don’t bust Hertha, I can start trying to ET produce a rocket with the Plug Nozzle …. and if I do, I can sell it).
Fig 6 — Hand at the end of the first cycle
End of Cycle — By the rules of M4, I can move the seniority disk to where I please, but it seems to me that the best VP will always be the “1 per claim disk” (since all the others are 1VP/something else, which is usually harder to get). I think I’m going to just roll a die and let it get placed randomly, but those VP seem like an area to tinker with.
It’s solitaire, after all.
So — how did the M4 help? Quite a bit. I’ve got 5VP (2 from Hubris, 2 from the Mars Glory Chit. and the rocket on the board). I’ve boosted a much heavier rocket than would be possible without Research Grants and the 8 Aq from the contract. Granted, most of those 8 Aqua went towards fuel tanks, but a) not all of them and b) I’m also immune to Budget Cuts for the rest of the game. (And if I were playing with augmentations, I’d have a chit to implant).
Is the Solitaire Assembly too good? It might be. But I had a fair number of earlier solitaire games where I’d simply get murdered in the first cycle by a bad roll (budget cuts if I didn’t boost, pad explosion if I did) and those are frustrating. It feels like it might be a bit too much control. One option would be to put in an NPC delegate (via d7 roll) on a non-event turn, so the active law wouldn’t be totally under the player’s control. But for now this game, I’ll just leave it.
Second Cycle, coming soon….
Remove a delegate to change an event to inspiration, or cancel an inspiration event. ︎
So instead of paying 1/card; I can get 1-2 cards free, or 3 cards for two aqua. The cards have to be supports of the main, as normal. ︎
Including two promoted Bernals (Ganymede and Dione) and three completed futures (Liberated Robots , Anti-matter research, and Supreme Cult). 130-ish VP, IIRC. ︎
And presumably listen to him during the entire flight. ︎
Perhaps its cost should go up each solar cycle, stop an early devastating bad roll, but get more expensive. ︎
As I was doing Solar Cycle 2 I noticed that my Dry Mass was 11, not 10, so I should have spent 6 Aqua, not 5) ︎
And Chaucer, since I have a raygun 2. Although it’s arguable whether I should take the time to try that simply land on Hertha so that I can refuel and go … if I bust. Still considering it. ︎
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