The BrettSpielWelt Java Client

BrettSpielWelt (often abbreviated BSW) is a large, popular, and entirely free German online gaming portal. Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany ( ˈbʊndəsʁepuˌbliːk ˈdɔʏtʃlant is a Country in Central Europe. Its name translates as Boardgame World. The portal contains online versions of over 50 popular classical and modern board games and card games, such as Backgammon, Bluff, Carcassonne, Can't Stop, Go, Lost Cities, Settlers of Catan, and Tichu. A board game is a Game in which counters or pieces that are placed on removed from or moved across a "board" (a premarked surface usually specific to that game Backgammon is a Board game for two players in which the playing pieces are moved according to the roll of Dice. Liar's dice, or Liar dice, with roots originating in South America and popularized in early Spanish History Carcassonne is a tile-based German-style Board game for two to five players designed by Klaus-Jürgen Wrede and published in 2000 Can't Stop is a Board game designed by Sid Sackson originally published by Parker Brothers in 1980, and was long Out of print Lost Cities is a 60-card Card game, designed in 1999 by game designer Reiner Knizia and published by several publishers Settlers of Catan is a multiplayer Board game designed by Klaus Teuber. Tichu is a multi-genre card game; primarily a shedding game that includes elements of Bridge and Poker played between two teams of two players

A Java-enabled browser is required to play, and registering with the site is not required. All major aspects of the Java client and website are also available in the English language. The portal is independent, non-commercial and free from advertising, except for indirectly advertising the games themselves. A non-commercial enterprise is work that values other considerations above and beyond that of making a profit As a result of the portal's popularity, some board game publishers have presented new board games on BrettSpielWelt when they are first published.

To play the games in English: download the client available from the website brettspielwelt. de, open the file Brettspielwelt. prop in a text editing program, and replace the line "Nation = de" with "Nation = en". Not all games have been translated, however, but players can introduce themselves to one of the English-speaking communities for advice and help.

History

BrettspielWelt started in 1998 as a project by Alexander Zbiek to play board games with his friends over the internet. The first version ran on a workstation in the Leibniz computing centre in Munich. Zbiek then teamed up with Regina Michl, Tobias Lang and Sebastian Mellin. After developing the program to be more stable and expandable, it was released to the public in 2000.

As of March 2007, BrettspielWelt supports over 60 different board games.

Community

BrettSpielWelt has an optional meta-game for its members, in which each game played earns experience points, credits and resources for the player. The metagame facilitates the building of smaller communities, set up as towns, for players to meet, chat and play. As a player increases in rank and his or her virtual wealth increases, he or she may build a virtual home in the online "world" that includes games that will earn credits and resources for the community.

There is a large contingent of English BrettSpielWelt players, and several towns aimed primarily at English speakers. These include Concordia, EnglishTown, Smallville, BurgundyRidge, and The. Great. White. North (primarily aimed at Canadians), as well as the multilingual Emerald. Country to "Dominion of Canada" or "Canadian Federation" or anything else please read the Talk Page City, Whitechapel and PiratesCove. There are also a ChinaTown for Chinese players, JapaneseIsle and Samurai for Japanese, KoreaTown for Koreans and LionRock for Hong Kong players. China ( Wade-Giles ( Mandarin) Chung¹kuo² is a cultural region, an ancient Civilization, and depending on perspective a National For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Japan topics. Korea is a geographic area composed of two sovereign countries a civilization and a former state situated on the Korean Peninsula in East Asia. Hong Kong ( officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, is a territory located on China 's south coast on the Pearl River Delta, and borders Other European language groups include DeLageLanden for Dutch and CarcassonnePlage for French players. The Netherlands ( Dutch:, ˈnedərlɑnt is the European part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, which consists of the Netherlands the Netherlands This article is about the country For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic France topics.

Games

The games available on BrettspielWelt are, for the most part, those which are known as German-style board games^[1], with a few notable exceptions (Tichu, Go, Can’t Stop). German-style board games are a broad class of games produced in recent decades in Germany and other countries Tichu is a multi-genre card game; primarily a shedding game that includes elements of Bridge and Poker played between two teams of two players Can't Stop is a Board game designed by Sid Sackson originally published by Parker Brothers in 1980, and was long Out of print

Some of the more notable games available are several Spiel des Jahres winners:

• Settlers of Catan
• Puerto Rico
• Thurn und Taxis
• Niagara
• Carcassonne
• Manhattan
• Bluff (Liar's Dice)
• Imperial

And Deutscher Spiele Preis winners:

• Saint Petersburg
• 6 nimmt!
• Caylus

Awards

BrettspielWelt was nominated for a Webby Award in 2004. The Spiel des Jahres ( German for Game of the Year) is a prestigious award for board and Card games The award Settlers of Catan is a multiplayer Board game designed by Klaus Teuber. Puerto Rico is a German board game designed by Andreas Seyfarth, and published in 2002 by Alea in German and by Rio Thurn and Taxis is a Board game designed by Karen and Andreas Seyfarth and published in 2006 by Hans im Glück in German (as Niagara is a German-style board game designed by Thomas Liesching and published in 2004 by Zoch zum Spielen and Rio Grande Games Carcassonne is a tile-based German-style Board game for two to five players designed by Klaus-Jürgen Wrede and published in 2000 Manhattan is a boardgame originally published by the German company Hans im Glück Liar's dice, or Liar dice, with roots originating in South America and popularized in early Spanish History Imperial is a German-style board game designed by Mac Gerdts in which the object is to accumulate wealth in the form of bond holdings in successful The Deutscher Spiele Preis (German for German Game Prize) is an award for German-style games It was started in 1990 by the German magazine "Die Pöppel-Revue" Saint Petersburg is a card-driven designer board game, with the design of the game credited to Michael Tummelhofer, a pseudonym for Caylus is a strategy oriented German-style board game designed by William Attia and independently published in 2005 by Ystari in France and It won the People's Voice Award for best Game site. ^[2]

External links

• Brettspielwelt English-language portal
• BSW Games List of games on Brettspielwelt
• Brettspielwelt Primer and a list of volunteer tutors at BoardGameGeek
• Emerald City Town Home Page

Notes

1. ^ Arar, Yardena (February 26, 2005). BoardGameGeek is a Website that was founded in January 2000 by Scott Alden and Derk Solko as a resource for the board gaming Hobby. Game Room: From Deutschland With Love. PC World.
2. ^ Webby Awards