Now available from Panini Press: EuroSprachGames

Car­cas­son­or­ant

In this in­geni­ous tile-lay­ing game, play­ers con­struct dia­lect re­gions by creat­ing a fic­tion­a­lized map of the south­ern French coun­try­side. Each play­er, in turn, draws a tile, which may bear a vowel or con­so­nant or an ur­ban or rur­al iso­gloss line. He must then place the tile such that it matches those al­ready played. Points are scored by com­pletely en­circl­ing a con­tig­uous re­gion with iso­gloss lines, by join­ing mul­ti­ple ur­ban pop­u­la­tions with­in a single “dia­lect” region, and by sabo­tag­ing an op­po­nent’s dia­lect region by caus­ing its de­fin­ing fea­ture to be­come un­pro­nounce­able.

Expan­sion mod­ules in­clude: Car­cas­son­or­ant North­ern France; Car­cas­son­or­ant Spain; Car­cas­son­or­ant Italy; Car­cas­son­or­ant Por­tu­gal; and the ul­tra-chal­leng­ing Car­cas­son­or­ant Pan-Ro­mance.

SprachSpiel des Jahres for 2000. ❦पा

Agricolangue

Agricolangue is a turn-based game in which players must create relationships of signifiers to signifieds on a small-scale family farm. Linguistic balance is the key: be careful not to let your pork to pigs relationships outnumber your beef to cows relationships, or you may find your family unable to speak before the end!

The abstract nature of Agricolangue makes it difficult for adults to learn, though children seem quite adept at mastering its rules quickly.

Experienced players may want to add the expansion module, Agricolangue Generative, which adds considerable complexity in the form of parameters which constrain the possible syntactic relationships of the signifiers.

SprachSpiel des Jahres for 2008. ❦पा