Fantaconclave 2025: five cardinals and a white smoke

01 · The omen

First cinema, then Sanremo

Edward Berger’s Conclave, adapted from Robert Harris’s novel, came out in 2024. I loved it. The conclave staged as a political thriller—with its alliances, rituals and the isolation of the Sistine Chapel—was an almost perfect narrative machine.

In February 2025, my cousins made me watch the Sanremo Music Festival and take part in Fantasanremo. Soon afterwards, increasingly grim reports began circulating about Pope Francis’s health. My anticlerical mind immediately started turning: a conclave version of Fantasanremo was too obvious and too wrong to ignore. I bought fantaconclave.eu.

02 · Easter Monday

The news shouted in the street

On Easter Monday I was taking a tour of esoteric Venice. I did not learn of Pope Francis’s death from a notification, but from Venetians shouting the news in the street.

At that moment the project stopped being a pre-emptive joke and became a race against time. The conclave would start on 7 May; the window for designing, developing, populating and publicising the site was extremely short.

03 · The game

Five cardinals and a few reckless predictions

In Fantaconclave, each player assembled a team of five cardinals: a captain—the candidate they truly backed—and four reserves. Players could also predict the future pontiff’s papal name and the number of black smoke signals before the election.

Teams could join private leagues, be shared through a link and compete in the global table. Points rewarded correct choices and predictions; once the extra omnes was declared, line-ups and forecasts were frozen until the white smoke.

The tone was deliberately irreverent, but the game used real people, dates and rituals. Underneath the joke was a small atlas of the leading candidates and the expectations that surrounded them during those days.

04 · The competition

I was not the only one

The same idea was taking shape in several places at once. The real competitor was Fantapapa.org, created by game developer Mauro Vanetti and data and AI architect Pietro Pace. It was closer to fantasy football: eleven cardinals, a captain and goalkeeper, leagues and a much broader prediction board.

There were also pope pools, shared spreadsheets and small fantasy conclaves on forums and social media, but none had the structure and coverage of the two public platforms.

05 · The results

Five thousand people entered my conclave

Despite the difference in media reach, about 5,000 people played Fantaconclave. The real conclave ended on 8 May: after two black smoke signals, Robert Francis Prevost was elected and chose the name Leo XIV. On the site, however, Matteo Maria Zuppi remained the pope of the people’s hearts.

Players

about 5,000

Black smokes

2

Elected pope

Robert F. Prevost

Papal name

Leo XIV

The leaderboard and percentages are those published in the fantaconclave.eu archive.