Vitoria brings the Cold War to life in a board game that has become a classic.

In this Cold War, the first thing the United States did once World War II ended was to start launching rockets into space. Meanwhile, South Korea fell into the hands of Kim Il-sung. However, in the adjacent Cold War, the Marshall Plan is already in motion, and it is noted that “Nasser has thrown a party in Egypt.” In another Cold War, Franco’s regime collapsed at the first opportunity. And so on, up to 128 cold wars, which are the games played at the International Convention of the board game Twilight Struggle, held in Vitoria on June 14 and 15. It is a game that has sold more than 200,000 copies worldwide and this year, 2025, marks its 20th anniversary since publication.

Twilight Struggle is a game for two players in which each contender assumes the role of one of the two superpowers of the Cold War: the United States or the Soviet Union. The game is played on a world map where players attempt to gain influence country by country as the years progress. The game emulates the tension characteristic of the Cold War. Twilight Struggle — a term used by JFK to describe the long and uncertain struggle that the West had with communism — is guided by a series of cards that depict the significant events of that historical period. The U.S. has, for example, the Iron Lady, while the Soviet Union has Che Guevara. The West benefits from the card in which John Paul II is elected Pope; the Soviet side, in turn, can take advantage of the event of the Cambridge Five. Additionally, players must keep an eye on the defcon level: triggering a nuclear war results in an immediate loss of the game. Unlike other games, this one disincentivizes atomic confrontation. “We wanted to capture the true ideological, political, and economic chess game that defined the Cold War,” explains Jason Matthews, co-author of the game along with Ananda Gupta. The success of these two decades confirms this. Twilight Struggle is already a classic in board games.

Jason Matthews is an American lawyer who works as a lobbyist in Washington and is a freelance board game designer. He answers questions from Adolfo Kunjuk News via email and reveals that the initial idea was to set the game in the Spanish Civil War: “I immersed myself in the topic, but the deeper I delved, the more I realized that I would need a lifetime (and perhaps a doctorate) to do it justice.” A friend then mentioned the Cold War. Bingo. Matthews had lived part of it and studied international relations in college. “When we created Twilight Struggle, I was working for the Senate Armed Services Committee, still very involved with the consequences of the Cold War, like the Nunn-Lugar program for nuclear disarmament in former Soviet states,” he explains. “That experience brought a certain realism — and perhaps a touch of cynicism — to the design. Working in government has a way of smoothing out any romantic ideas about international diplomacy.” Among other responsibilities, Matthews has been part of a Democratic senator’s team in the United States Capitol.

The game was designed at the beginning of this century. A decade had passed since the fall of the Iron Curtain, and the attacks on the Twin Towers in New York had opened a new era. “After 9/11, there was a strange American nostalgia for the Cold War. Not for the danger but for the clarity. You knew who your enemy was, their motives, their capacities. That certainty faded in the era of terrorist cells and asymmetric warfare. I think Twilight Struggle resonated partly because it allowed players to return to that more ‘ordered’ chaos.” Matthews details that the game presents a realistic view in which countries seek power and act in their own interest. “There is no brash American triumphalism here. Yes, I personally believe the world is better off thanks to the victory of the West, but the game does not shy away from criticizing both superpowers. I think that honesty is why the game has found an audience in places like Poland, Hungary, China, and even Russia.”

The winner of the international championship held in Vitoria, Aleksei Lobenko, 29, is originally from Russia but lives in the Netherlands: “I’m from Russia, so this topic is interesting to me; I have learned a lot about Cold War history, and I also enjoy the competitive aspect: it’s a two-player, face-to-face game.” For Juli Arnalot from Barcelona, another participant in the competition, “the game captures the essence of the Cold War exceedingly well.” Bidart Larrakoetxea, also a player, confesses that he has learned a lot from the game: “There were events I didn’t know the implications of, and then I got informed about them.” In fact, Twilight Struggle is often used for educational purposes in some schools. Markel Elortza, a teacher at a high school in Vitoria and a member of the Twilight Struggle Federation of Euskal Herria which organized the convention, states: “In June, I usually bring the game to the students in their fourth year of secondary school, and with the map on the table, we review the historical events of the cards, and they like it because it’s something different.” However, the success of the game also lies in its gameplay successes. The creators reduced the time and difficulty associated with such war and strategy games. They made it more accessible. Twilight Struggle was ranked number 1 for five years in the Board Game Geek ranking, the leading global reference website in the sector (it currently occupies number 14).

In Spain, the game has also been a success, although publishing it was no easy task. It was published in 2012 by the Devir publishing house, whose team includes several ‘wargamers’ (fans of wargames, war games) who were aware of what was brewing at GMT, the original American publisher of the game. “We met at a convention and told them we intended to publish the game in Spanish,” recalls Xavi Garriga, editorial director of Devir, “and they said absolutely not.” But for unexpected reasons. “They were convinced that it was impossible for us to produce a run that would sell enough to make it profitable. We had to convince them that it was our risk and our money, regardless. In the end, they agreed, but looked at us as if we were crazy. And look, we just published the 11th edition of the game.” Devir has sold about 30,000 copies, ten times more than what they could typically sell with such a game. And the commitment continues: this year they released the Catalan edition.