Weekly Hotness: Week of June 30, 2026

The BGG Hotness this week belongs to a video game franchise. Kingdom Come: Deliverance - The Board Game sits at #1, and a second board game adaptation of the same franchise - set during the Hussite Wars - takes #2. Two tabletop versions of the same video game series debuting on the hotness in the same week is unusual. It hasn’t happened with this kind of franchise crossover before on this list, at least not in recent memory.

Behind the Czech RPG double, Wingspan Pocket debuts at #3 - a card-driven, lighter take on the most-discussed engine-builder of the last decade. Duel of Meloch, a two-player crossover between Scythe and Expeditions, enters at #4. Twelve new names appear on the list compared to three weeks ago. Only eight games from the June 15 article survive, most of them drifting downward. The Concordia dominance of mid-June is completely gone.

This Week’s Top 20

Dropped off: Concordia: Special Edition (#1), Altera (#2), Rattlesnake (#4), Concordia (#5), Harmonies: Pulse (#6), 8 Dragons (#8), Harmonies: Crescendo (#9), Deep Regrets (#13), Eternal Decks (#16), Drillers (#18), Entropy (#19), Ark Nova (#20)

The Kingdom Come Double - same franchise, two board games, both on the list

Kingdom Come: Deliverance is a first-person RPG set in medieval Bohemia - developed by Czech studio Warhorse - that became one of the more surprising critical and commercial successes of the last decade. It’s grounded, historically-minded, and deliberately unheroic. Its sequel, set during the Hussite Wars, launched in early 2025.

Now there are board game adaptations of both. The first - Kingdom Come: Deliverance - The Board Game - sets players in 1403 Bohemia amid a political crisis, positioning “ordinary people” as agents in a world of warring nobles and kings. The second (BGG entry 347374) moves the setting forward to the Hussite period: a religious and military conflict that turned “brother against brother.” Both debuted on the hotness on the same week, landing at #1 and #2.

There’s an obvious explanation: the video game franchise has a loyal audience, and board game fans who overlap with that audience generated simultaneous interest the moment both projects became visible on BGG. But what’s notable is the scale of it. Video game-to-board game adaptations tend to generate a spike, then settle. Having two entries from the same franchise occupy the top two spots at once is the kind of thing that happens when an announcement lands right - both games probably surfaced within days of each other.

Whether both hold on next week or collapse back into obscurity will say a lot about how deep the interest runs. Crowdfunding launches, if they are planned, would extend the attention. For now, it’s the clearest franchise moment the hotness has seen this year.

Wingspan Pocket - a lighter version of the most-played euro of the decade

Wingspan needs no introduction for anyone who plays modern board games. It’s been the entry point for a significant slice of the hobby over the last seven years. Wingspan Pocket takes that formula and strips it down: double-sided cards (food side and bird side), a single active row per player, and a shorter game.

The design strips away the engine-building depth that made Wingspan what it is, but that’s apparently the point. A pocket-sized, lower-weight version extends the brand to contexts where the full game doesn’t fit - travel, lighter groups, shorter sessions. Elizabeth Hargrave and Stonemaier know what they’re doing with this franchise; every Wingspan release generates a wave of hotness activity regardless of whether it’s the best game in the box. At #3, Pocket is performing exactly as expected for a major Wingspan product announcement.

Duel of Meloch - Scythe meets Expeditions in 45 minutes

Duel of Meloch is unusual in what it’s trying to do: it’s a standalone 2-player game that deliberately combines the mechanisms of two existing Jamey Stegmaier games. One player uses Scythe rules and components (including a new faction and player mat); the other plays with Expeditions rules and components. The result is a head-to-head clash that plays in 45 minutes.

Cross-game mechanical mashups are rare in mainstream design - most publishers treat their titles as standalone products. A designer doing it intentionally with their own games, and packaging it as a new standalone release, is a different kind of project. Whether the hybrid holds together mechanically or just novelty-tests two existing fanbases will depend on play experience, but the concept alone explains the hotness position. Scythe fans and Expeditions fans have good reason to be curious.

SETI’s 10-Spot Climb - the slow burn continues

SETI: Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence moved from #17 to #7 - a ten-position jump. This is not a new-release bump; SETI has appeared on multiple previous hotness lists this year. It keeps resurfacing rather than fading, which is the signature of a game that’s found an audience and keeps getting discovered by new people. Discussion, reviews, and play session posts continue to generate BGG activity long after the initial release window.

SETI is a medium-weight euro about building a scientific program to detect extraterrestrial signals. It doesn’t have the crossover appeal of a franchise adaptation or a Wingspan-adjacent brand, so its persistence on the hotness is a signal of genuine player enthusiasm rather than hype. At #7 this week, it’s the strongest performer among returning games.

The Holdovers - who survived three weeks

Eight games from the June 15 list appear here, all trending downward or flat:

Container (#5, was #3) continues its slow fade from a stronger debut. It’s dropped only two spots in three weeks, which is decent retention for a non-franchise title.

The Old King’s Crown (#11, was #11) is the only game to hold its exact position. Three weeks of hotness activity and it’s in the same place. That’s either remarkable stability or a floor - it’s hard to say which without watching what happens next.

World Order (#12, was #7) has been a consistent presence for months. Five spots down but still on the list; it’s one of those games that refuses to disappear entirely.

Harmonies (#20, was #10) dropped ten spots and landed at the bottom of the list. The Harmonies expansion wave that dominated the June 15 list - three entries from the same franchise - has fully collapsed. The expansions are gone; the base game barely clings on at #20. That’s a fast cycle from franchise wave to tail-end holdout.

Notable New Entries

Defenders of Hogwarts (#13) is a Harry Potter game designed and published by MinaLima - the graphic design duo behind the visual identity of the HP film universe. The thematic pedigree is obvious, but MinaLima’s involvement as publisher rather than just illustrators makes this an unusual licensed game. It’s spell-casting and castle defense, set during Voldemort’s siege of Hogwarts.

Nippon: Zaibatsu (#15) is a new edition of Nippon, an area-majority economic game set in Japan’s industrial era. New editions of established games generate reliable hotness activity; the question is always whether the update changes enough to matter or just refreshes the art. Worth watching.

Sankoré: The Pride of Mansa Musa (#19) has the best setting on the list. Players manage the University of Sankoré in 14th-century Timbuktu, tasked by Mansa Musa with spreading knowledge across West Africa. It’s a 1-4 player euro, and its presence in the hotness suggests it’s finally getting the attention the theme warrants.

The Quest for El Dorado (#8) is a Reiner Knizia deck-building race through South American jungles. This is an older title getting another hotness moment - possibly tied to a new printing or edition announcement. Its BGG ranking places it among the more celebrated lighter games in the hobby.

Twelve new games, two from the same franchise at the top, and Concordia’s month-long run on the list is entirely over. Next week will tell whether the Kingdom Come adaptations have legs or whether they were a one-week announcement spike. The Wingspan Pocket and Duel of Meloch positions will be worth tracking too - both have franchise backing that could sustain their runs.