Alea big box series

alea was started as a new label within Ravensburger in 1999. Each of their games in a particular sized box is numbered in order of publication, yielding their Big Box Series, the Alea Revised Big Box Series, the Alea Medium Box Series, the Alea Small Box Series, and the Alea Very Small Box Series.

Through the publication of Macao, alea versions of the games were German language only. Rio Grande Games published many English language versions of these games, however both Chinatown and Adel Verpflichtet were not published by Rio Grande Games in this manner.

Since Macao, both Die Burgen von Burgund and Bora Bora were published with multilingual rules in the box, as it was the expressed direction of Alea to take over English publication of their own titles.

However the 2014 Puerto Rico edition was again published only in German, widely regarded as the "Second Edition" as it featured all the expansions and the updated art used in the Anniversary Edition, but not the component quality or metal coins. Versions of this game in other non-English languages soon followed. A future english edition of this version has not been confirmed or ruled out by Ravensburger, but Rio Grande Games appears to still publish the first edition in English. This fuelled internet speculation that some licensing conflict between RGG and Ravensburger is preventing the second edition in English. In early 2018 a Chinese/English multilingual version became available in Hong Kong, further complicating the situation.

The "big box" games and their respective year of initial publication:

1. Ra (1999)
2. Chinatown (1999)
3. Tadsch Mahal (Taj Mahal) (2000)
4. Die Fürsten von Florenz (The Princes of Florence) (2000)
5. Adel Verpflichtet (Hoity Toity) (2000)
6. Die Händler von Genua (The Traders of Genoa) (2001)
7. Puerto Rico (2002)
8. Eiszeit (Mammoth Hunters) (2003)
9. Fifth Avenue (2004)
10. Um Ru(h)m und Ehre (Rum & Pirates) (2006)
11. Notre Dame (2007)
12. Im Jahr des Drachen (In the Year of the Dragon) (2007)
13. Macao (2009)
14. Die Burgen von Burgund (The Castles of Burgundy) (2011)
15. Bora Bora (2013)
16. Puerto Rico w/Expansions (2014) The German 2014 reprint included new art and a new number on the box spine. Since it comes with the expansions, it is listed as an edition of Puerto Rico
17. Broom Service (2015)
18. Carpe Diem (2018)

The first 7 games in the Alea big box series were highly praised on BGG, and are often given as examples of gamers games. All but one, Adel Verpflichtet, rank in the top 250 games on BGG as of May 13, 2011. The following three games–Eiszeit, Fifth Avenue, Um Ru(h)m und Ehre–have remained substantially lower ranked. The more recent games, Notre Dame, Im Jahr des Drachen, Macao and Die Burgen von Burgund could be considered a return to form, as all are rated in the top 150 as of November 14, 2012 with Die Burgen von Burgund even cracking the top 25. The latest release Bora Bora continued this trend and cracked the top 100.

Other series by alea include the Alea medium box series, Alea small box series and Alea very small box series.

• The English version of Mammoth Hunters, while having a similar box art style as the others in the series, does not actually have a number 8 printed on the box.
  • Jay Tummelson discusses his reasoning for this break in the numbers being printed on the Rio Grande Games boxes and why he didn't do RGG editions of Chinatown and Adel Verpflichtet on the Boardgame Babylon podcast, Volume 36.
• The Swedish/Finnish edition of Puerto Rico was renumbered #1 by the publisher, and the separator between the author and game name was dropped.
• Different games of the series are published in Dutch:
  • Ra was published by 999 Games. Same box art, no number.
  • Chinatown was published by Quined White Goblin Games. Different box art, no number.
  • Taj Mahal was published by Quined White Goblin Games. Different box art, no number.
  • Princes of Florence was published by Quined White Goblin Games. Different box art, no number.
  • Adel Verpflichtet was published by Jumbo. Different box art, no number.
  • Die Händler von Genua was published by Quined White Goblin Games. Different box art, no number.
  • Puerto Rico was published by Ravensburger. Same box art, no number.
  • Macao was published by White Goblin Games. Same box art, no number.