In Late 2025, KOSMOS Challenges You to Fight Zombies, Hollywood, Empty Meadows, and One Another
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I haven’t yet sent publishers the SPIEL Essen 25 survey, but many of them have already started promoting their game releases in the second half of 2025. Here’s what German publisher KOSMOS has in the pipeline:
▪️ Look at that Staying Alive cover to the right — so glorious! You can’t help but imagine an intense zombie battle set to music by the Bee Gees:
And we’re stayin’ alive, stayin’ alive
Ah, ah, ah, ah
Seems like something James Gunn would do. In any case, here’s an overview of this 3-5 player game from Kalle Krenzer that’s due out on October 15, 2025:
Each mission in Staying Alive requires equipment, supplies, items, and weapons, with additional cards providing further challenges. The game is played co-operatively and in real time – the hourglass is ticking and must be kept in check!
Each player tries to combine and discard their cards, but only the player whose turn it is can speak. What information and reactions are important? Who can you help, and what should you remember?
If things aren’t going well in the game, here’s what to say on your turn:
Somebody help me
Somebody help me, yeah
▪️ Another October 15 release is Tag Team, a two-player game from Gricha German and Corentin Lebrat that originates from Canadian publisher Scorpion Masqué (which will release the game in English and French), but I haven’t covered this game previously in this space, so let’s get to it:
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In more detail, you start with a deck of only two cards, and the fight unfolds automatically: Flip your cards one at a time and apply their effects. At the end of each round, you get to turn up the heat on the opposing team by strategically adding new cards to program your deck — but without reordering the cards already present. Determine what makes your tag team tick, play devastating combos, and dominate your opponent by deftly blocking their attacks. Timing is everything if you want to emerge victorious and knock out your foe!
▪️ Another two-player-only game due out at the same time is Four Planets, from Polish designer Piotr Dachtera. Here’s an overview of this thirty-minute game:
In the duel game Four Planets, two captains set off into space with their spaceships to recruit the most capable minds in the galaxy to advance their own home planet. Round after round, four alien planets are visited – but only the first to arrive gets the choice. Who specializes in technology, economics, or knowledge? Who prefers special equipment or botany?
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Four Planets is a tactical game with a special card-selection mechanism, tricky decisions, and great game depth.
▪️ Kasper Lapp‘s 2-5 player game Wildwuchs (Wild Growth) looks like one of the standard KOSMOS small boxes, as with The Crew, but the box is almost eleven inches tall, presumably to house the special components hinted at in this description:
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Clever decisions are required in this interactive gaming experience that features short waiting times and special combo effects. Whoever has the largest wildflower meadow blooming at the end wins — and as a special treat for nature fans, you’ll have your own 3D wildflower meadow!
▪️ The Masters of Crime detective series from Lukas Setzke, Martin Student, and Verena Wiechens will continue in 2025, with August bringing the 1-6 player game Masters of Crime: Hollywood:
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In Masters of Crime: Hollywood, players become gang members to investigate the murder by using Google Maps, writing emails, searching websites, and calling phone numbers. What dark secrets are the high society of Hollywood Hills keeping? Together, the gang members decide how the story will continue. Solve puzzles, combine facts, and question them: This is where real detective work comes into play!
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▪️ Several game series continue in the KOSMOS catalog, with EXIT: Das Spiel – Die letzte Vorstellung (The Final Performance) from Inka, Markus, and Emely Brand challenging players to solve a mystery involving a circus act; EXIT: Das Spiel – Family: Backstage Boys/Jahrmarkt im Dunkeln from the same design team giving younger players some non-murderous challenges; and Adventure Games: Mission Mars from Matthew Dunstan and Phil Walker-Harding sending players on a long-distance rescue mission in 2076.
▪️ Additionally, Keith Piggott‘s 2024 title River of Gold will be released on the German market as Am Goldenen Fluss.
