Recently, Germany held its annual Spiel des Jahres event. It is one of the biggest award shows in the tabletop industry, rewarding sharp game design and excellent quality. And one of its winners, Matteo Menapace, has been permanently banned from all future events. This was due to a sticker he chose to wear, and the message it sent.
Matteo Menapace and Spiel des Jahres
The banning of Matteo Menapace from Spiel des Jahres was announced via post on their official website. The post explains the reason for Menapace’s ban. While attending the event, Menapace wore a sticker on stage in the Palestinian national colors represented as a watermelon.
The small sticker was attached to Menapace’s t-shirt during the event. During the event, the sticker was not noticed. However, shortly after, chairman Harald Schrapers and deputy chairman Christoph Schlewinski asked Menapace to hand over the sticker, forbade him to show it during photographs, and said he would no longer be welcome at future award events.
According to the Spiel des Jahres association, the intended message of this sticker, that of a “Great Palestine” denies the existence of the State of Israel. In context, this is an expression of antisemitism, which exceeded the limits of legitimate political expression at the event.
Furthermore, it goes against the organization’s “Playing For Tolerance” initiative, which is against any form of racism and antisemitism. This initiative has been in place for years.
Matteo Menapace and Matt Leacock won this year’s Kennerspiel des Jahres award for complex games at Spiel des Jahres. The award was for their climate action-focused board game Daybreak (aka e-mission in Germany).
It is a co-op experience where you and your friends control a global power. Your goal is to dismantle the causes of climate change and reduce global emissions to net zero. In addition, you must help reform and rebuild world societies that protect people from life-threatening crises. If global temps get too high or if too many people are in crisis, you all lose.
