Road to SPIEL 2026: Queen Alice - Checkmate Through the Looking-Glass

Alice has been through the looking-glass before. This time, however, Wonderland has a staffing problem.

A mysterious message appears backwards on her mirror, “Alicem we need a new queen”. Alice steps through and finds herself facing a coronation, a banquet and a court populated by familiar chess pieces. Whether she ultimately becomes the Red Queen or the Whie Queen is going to depend on the players pulling the strings behind the scenes.

Welcome to Queen Alice, a striking mid-heavy Eurogame from Spanish publisher Combo Games, designed by Hector Carrion Benavent and David Heras Pino, with artwork by Amelia Sales. The game plays for 1-4 players and is due to make its full debut at this years SPIEL Essen 2026.

What is it?

Inspired by Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking-Glass, Queen Alice borrows Wodnerland;s characetrs and chess imagery to tell its own story.

Players are memebers of the court tsaked with preparing Alice’s coronation banquet. Do the best job and you’ll become the new queen’s most trusted adviser. Naturally, this being Wonderland, things aren’t quite that straightforrward.

Throughout the game, players influence whether Alice will ultimately wear the red or white crown. That decision matters because various objectives (Alice’s Wishes) will only score if the appropriate side triumphs. The result is an engine-building Euro in which you’re not only developing your own position but also watching which queen your opponents appear to be backing.

How does it play?

Combo Games calls Queen Alice’s central mechanism “Chess-building”.

Cards in your hand have multiple uses. You can discard one for an immediate effect, or play another to move one of the chess pieces occupying the central board. Those pieces move accordingly to the traditional rules of chess - knights jump, bishops travel diagonally, and so on - and their movement determines which actions you can activate.

Those actions take place across several Wonderland locations, including the Flower Garden, Humpty Dumpty’s Wall, the Tweedledum and Tweedledee tree, and the King’s Messenger’s. As the game progresses you will acquire improved cards, resources, and passive abilities, steadily making those actions more powerful.

Meanwhile, players are manipulating Alice’s influence towards red or white. This is particularly important because not every objective will necessarily score. You may spend the game constructing a beautifully efficient engine only to discover that another player has been quietly pushing Alice towards a coronation colour that makes some of your plans considerably less valuable.

Why we’re watching it

There are no shortage of Alice-inspired tabletop games out there, but for me Queen Alice looks stunning and really stands out. Amelia Sales’ illustrations are fantastic, and really embrace the surrealism of Wonderland and art from the period in which Caroll wrote the original stories.

The game was originally financed via crowdfunding, bringing in over €300,000 in pledges, and has been riding high on BoardGameGeek’s The Hotness, where it is still currently in the Top 10 as I write this. Queen Alice has also been appearing on numerous SPIEL 2026 anticipation lists - and I’m certainly not surprised given how it looks and the quality of its production.

Mechanically it also appeals, with it’s combination of chess movement, multi-use cards, and engine-building alongside a shared struggle over which scoring conditions will actually matter at the games end. I’m certainly looking forward to seeing whether the battle over the Red and White crowns creates the interaction that heavier engine-building games sometimes lack and if the game actually plays as well as it looks on the table.

The Game at SPIEL Essen 2026

Queen Alice is scheduled for its European launch around SPIEL Essen 2026, following its successful Gamefound campaign. Combo Games has stated that crowdfunding backers will receive copies before normal retail distribution begins, although Essen copies may be made available separately for the show.

Combo Games will be in Hall 3, Stand U210, with Queen Alice available for Essen preorder collection as well as at the stand.

The international edition includes English, German, French and Spanish rules, with no necessary in-game text beyond the rulebook.

SPIEL Essen runs from 22nd-25th October 2026.

Queen Alice at a glance

Publisher: Combo Games

Designers: Hector Carrion Benavent & David Heras Pino

Artist: Amelia Sales

Players: 1-4

Ages: 14+

Playing Time: 30-120 minutes

Type: Engine building / hand management / multi-use cards / action selection

Signature mechanism: Chess-building

Languages: English, German, French & Spanish

SPIEL: Hall 3, Stand U210

More information: Queen Alice on Gamefound

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