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70-408: The game is played on a 9×9 board whose central square (called "the maze") is marked with a different color or a sign. Each player has nine pieces: The objective of the game is to get absolute power by being the last chief alive on board. Although informal alliances can be temporarily agreed upon, there is no team: each player plays against the other players. The pieces are placed in each corner of

140-457: A games inventor said when interviewed about his game, The Great Train Robbery : With crime you deal with every basic human emotion and also have enough elements to combine action with melodrama. The player's imagination is fired as they plan to rob the train. Because of the gamble, they take in the early stage of the game there is a build-up of tension, which is immediately released once the train

210-577: A dice game such as Ludo , by giving each player the choice of rolling the dice or using the previous player's roll. Another important aspect of some games is diplomacy, that is, players, making deals with one another. Negotiation generally features only in games with three or more players, cooperative games being the exception. An important facet of Catan , for example, is convincing players to trade with you rather than with opponents. In Risk , two or more players may team up against others. Easy diplomacy involves convincing other players that someone else

280-445: A game belongs to several categories. The namesake of the board game, gameboards would seem to be a necessary and sufficient condition of the genre , though card games that do not use a standard deck of cards (as well as games that use neither cards nor a gameboard) are often colloquially included, with some scholars therefore referring to said genre as that of "table and board games" or " tabletop games ", or seeing board games as

350-479: A game piece. Playing board games has also been tied to improving children's executive functions and help reduce risks of dementia for the elderly. Related to this is a growing academic interest in the topic of game accessibility, culminating in the development of guidelines for assessing the accessibility of modern tabletop games and the extent to which they are playable for people with disabilities. Additionally, board games can be therapeutic. Bruce Halpenny ,

420-417: A player kills the chief of another player, they take control of the remaining living pieces of this one. At their turn, they will have the choice between using one of their own pieces, or using one of the captured pieces. When a player has no necromobile and their chief is surrounded by corpses, they are eliminated (except if they are in power, in the maze). Their pieces now belong to the chief in power. If there

490-753: A player moves their token, as in Monopoly , to how their forces fare in battle, as in Risk , or which resources a player gains, as in Catan . Other games such as Sorry! use a deck of special cards that, when shuffled, create randomness. Scrabble does something similar with randomly picked letters. Other games use spinners, timers of random length, or other sources of randomness. German-style board games are notable for often having fewer elements of luck than many North American board games. Luck may be reduced in favour of skill by introducing symmetry between players. For example, in

560-471: A player wins by capturing all opposing pieces, while Eurogames often end with a calculation of final scores. Pandemic is a cooperative game where players all win or lose as a team, and peg solitaire is a puzzle for one person. There are many varieties of board games. Their representation of real-life situations can range from having no inherent theme, such as checkers , to having a specific theme and narrative, such as Cluedo . Rules can range from

630-420: A skilled player will win more often. The elements of luck can also make for more excitement at times, and allow for more diverse and multifaceted strategies, as concepts such as expected value and risk management must be considered. Luck may be introduced into a game by several methods. The use of dice of various sorts goes back to the earliest board games . These can decide everything from how many steps

700-416: A subgenre of tabletop games. H. J. R. Murray 's A History of Board Games Other Than Chess (1952) has been called the first attempt to develop a "scheme for the classification of board games". David Parlett 's Oxford History of Board Games (1999) defines four primary categories: race games (where the goal is to be the first to move all one's pieces to the final destination), space games (in which

770-399: A turn (if there are two players, they play twice consecutively). When they leave the maze, they lose this power. A chief in power takes control of the pieces of the surrounded chiefs, and keeps them after losing the power. A chief in power cannot be killed by a militant. The surrounding has no effect on them as long as they stay on the maze. An assassin, a troublemaker or a necromobile can go in

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840-532: Is a group of strategy board games for two players which involve forward movements of uniform game pieces and mandatory captures by jumping over opponent pieces. Checkers is developed from alquerque . The term "checkers" derives from the checkered board which the game is played on, whereas "draughts" derives from the verb "to draw" or "to move". The most popular forms of checkers in Anglophone countries are American checkers (also called English draughts ), which

910-531: Is a large facet of the market, with $ 233 million raised on Kickstarter in 2020. A 1991 estimate for the global board game market was over $ 1.2 billion. A 2001 estimate for the United States "board games and puzzle" market gave a value of under $ 400 million, and for United Kingdom, of about £50 million. A 2009 estimate for the Korean market was put at 800 million won, and another estimate for

980-413: Is a list of some of the most common game categories: Although many board games have a jargon all their own, there is a generalized terminology to describe concepts applicable to basic game mechanics and attributes common to nearly all board games. Checkers Checkers ( American English ), also known as draughts ( / d r ɑː f t s , d r æ f t s / ; British English ),

1050-604: Is called "ντάμα" (dama), which is also one term for the queen in chess. Similar games have been played for millennia. A board resembling a checkers board was found in Ur dating from 3000 BC. In the British Museum are specimens of ancient Egyptian checkerboards, found with their pieces in burial chambers, and the game was played by the pharaoh Hatshepsut . Plato mentioned a game, πεττεία or petteia , as being of Egyptian origin, and Homer also mentions it. The method of capture

1120-485: Is hidden from players. This makes finding the best move more difficult and may involve estimating probabilities by the opponents. Many board games are now available as video games. These are aptly termed digital board games, and their distinguishing characteristic compared to traditional board games is they can now be played online against a computer or other players. Some websites (such as boardgamearena.com, yucata.de, etc.) allow play in real time and immediately show

1190-511: Is no chief in power, then the pieces cannot be moved or killed, until the moment when a chief takes the power, and captures them in that way (they keep control on these pieces even if they leave the maze). The central square of the board (E5) is called the maze. Each piece can go through this square, but the chief is the only piece that can stop on it. A chief who is in the maze is a chief "in power". They play one time after each player. For instance, if there are four players, they play three times in

1260-460: Is no draw with one king and men versus one king. 10x10 15 10x10 15 Column draughts (Russian towers), also known as Bashni , is a kind of draughts, known in Russia since the beginning of the nineteenth century, in which the game is played according to the usual rules of Russian draughts, but with the difference that the captured man is not removed from the playing field: rather, it is placed under

1330-485: Is placed on the number of moves that are allowed in between jumps (which is a reasonable generalisation of the drawing rule in standard Checkers), then the problem is in PSPACE, thus it is PSPACE-complete. However, without this bound, Checkers is EXPTIME-complete. However, other problems have only polynomial complexity : In an ending with three kings versus one king, the player with three kings must win in thirteen moves or

1400-606: Is played in Turkey, Kuwait, Israel, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Greece, and several other locations in the Middle East, as well as in the same locations as Russian checkers. There are several variants in these countries, with the Armenian variant (called tama ) allowing also forward-diagonal movement of men and the Greek requiring the king to stop directly after the captured piece. With this rule, there

1470-403: Is played on an 8×8 checkerboard ; Russian draughts and Turkish draughts , both on an 8x8 board; and International draughts , played on a 10×10 board – with the latter widely played in many countries worldwide. There are many other variants played on 8×8 boards. Canadian checkers and Malaysian/Singaporean checkers (also locally known as dam ) are played on a 12×12 board. American checkers

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1540-403: Is possible, capturing is mandatory in most official rules. If the player does not capture, the other player can remove the opponent's piece as a penalty (or muffin), and where there are two or more such positions the player forfeits pieces that cannot be moved (although some rule variations make capturing optional). In almost all variants, a player with no valid move remaining loses. This occurs if

1610-415: Is robbed. Release of tension is therapeutic and useful in our society because most jobs are boring and repetitive. Playing games has been suggested as a viable addition to the traditional educational curriculum if the content is appropriate and the gameplay informs students on the curriculum content. There are several ways in which board games can be classified, and considerable overlap may exist, so that

1680-528: Is the oldest board game known to have existed. Senet was pictured in a fresco painting found in Merknera's tomb (3300–2700 BC). Also from predynastic Egypt is mehen . Hounds and jackals , another ancient Egyptian board game, appeared around 2000 BC. The first complete set of this game was discovered from a Theban tomb that dates to the 13th dynasty . This game was also popular in Mesopotamia and

1750-399: Is winning and should therefore be teamed up against. Advanced diplomacy (e.g., in the aptly named game Diplomacy ) consists of making elaborate plans together, with the possibility of betrayal. In perfect information games, such as chess, each player has complete information on the state of the game, but in other games, such as Tigris and Euphrates or Stratego , some information

1820-699: The Caucasus . Backgammon originated in ancient Mesopotamia about 5,000 years ago. Ashtapada , chess , pachisi and chaupar originated in India. Go (4th century BC) and liubo (1st century BC) originated in China. The board game Patolli originated in Mesoamerica and was played by a wide range of pre-Columbian cultures such as the Toltecs and the Aztecs . The royal game of Ur

1890-400: The "hobby game market" ("the market for those games regardless of whether they're sold in the hobby channel or other channels,") at over $ 700 million. A similar 2015 estimate suggested a hobby game market value of almost $ 900 million. A dedicated field of research into gaming exists, known as game studies or ludology. While there has been a fair amount of scientific research on

1960-561: The 13th-century book Libro de los juegos . The rule of crowning was used by the 13th century, as it is mentioned in the Philippe Mouskés 's Chronique in 1243 when the game was known as Fierges , the name used for the chess queen (derived from the Persian ferz , meaning royal counsellor or vizier). The pieces became known as "dames" when that name was also adopted for the chess queen. The rule forcing players to take whenever possible

2030-586: The American board game market for the same year was at about $ 800 million. A 2011 estimate for the Chinese board game market was at over 10 billion yuan . A 2013 estimate put the size of the German toy market at 2.7 billion euros (out of which the board games and puzzle market is worth about 375 million euros), and Polish markets at 2 billion and 280 million zlotys , respectively. In 2009, Germany

2100-571: The Gaming Acts of 1710 and 1845 . Early board game producers in the second half of the eighteenth century were mapmakers. The global popularization of board games, with special themes and branding, coincided with the formation of the global dominance of the British Empire . John Wallis was an English board game publisher, bookseller, map/chart seller, printseller, music seller, and cartographer . With his sons John Wallis Jr. and Edward Wallis, he

2170-587: The Middle East, mancala is a popular board game archetype with many regional variations. In India, a community game called Carrom is popular. A popular board game of flicking stones ( Alkkagi ) is popular in South Korea . In the late 1990s, companies began producing more new games to serve a growing worldwide market. In the 2010s, several publications said board games were amid a new Golden Age or "renaissance". Board game venues also grew in popularity; in 2016 alone, more than 5,000 board game cafés opened in

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2240-515: The U.S., and they were reported to be very popular in China as well. Board games have been used as a mechanism for science communication . Some games, such as chess, depend completely on player skill, while many children's games such as Candy Land and snakes and ladders require no decisions by the players and are decided purely by luck. Many games require some level of both skill and luck. A player may be hampered by bad luck in backgammon , Monopoly , or Risk ; but over many games,

2310-728: The United States and its sister game Traveller's Tour Through Europe were published by New York City bookseller F. & R. Lockwood in 1822 and claim the distinction of being the first board games published in the United States. Margaret Hofer described the period of the 1880s–1920s as "The Golden Age" of board gaming in America. Board game popularity was boosted, like that of many items, through mass production , which made them cheaper and more easily available. Different traditional board games are popular in Asian and African countries. In China, Go and many variations of chess are popular. In Africa and

2380-625: The ability to anticipate moves, plays an essential role in chess-playing ability. Linearly arranged board games have improved children's spatial numerical understanding. This is because the game is similar to a number line in that they promote a linear understanding of numbers rather than the innate logarithmic one. Research studies show that board games such as Snakes and Ladders result in children showing significant improvements in aspects of basic number skills such as counting, recognizing numbers, numerical estimation, and number comprehension. They also practice fine motor skills each time they grasp

2450-430: The ability to move any amount of squares at a time (in international checkers), move backwards and, in variants where men cannot already do so, capture backwards. Like a man, a king can make successive jumps in a single turn, provided that each jump captures an enemy piece. In international draughts, kings (also called flying kings ) move any distance. They may capture an opposing man any distance away by jumping to any of

2520-413: The board (the pieces are turned upside down to show that they are "dead"). The militant kills by occupying the square of a piece (capture by replacement). They place the corpse on an unoccupied square of their choice, except on the central square (the "maze"). A militant cannot kill a chief in power (see the maze below). The diplomat and the necromobile cannot kill the other pieces but can move them. When

2590-461: The board as shown in the picture above. Order of play is red - blue - yellow - green. Each player, at their turn, moves one of their pieces, and can possibly capture a piece in this way. The militants move of one or two squares in the eight directions; the other pieces can move through any number of squares in the eight directions. A piece cannot jump above another piece. The pieces are "killed" as soon as they are captured, but their "corpses" stay on

2660-482: The board gaming market is estimated to be smaller than that for video games , it has also experienced significant growth from the late 1990s. A 2012 article in The Guardian described board games as "making a comeback". Other expert sources suggest that board games never went away, and that board games have remained a popular leisure activity which has only grown over time. Another from 2014 gave an estimate that put

2730-486: The cells of a square grid was not already known to the Moors who brought it, which it probably was, either via playing on a chessboard (in about 1100, probably in the south of France, this was done once again using backgammon pieces, thereby each piece was called a "fers", the same name as the chess queen , as the move of the two pieces was the same at the time) or adapting Seega using jumping capture. The rules are given in

2800-474: The first computer checkers and arguably the first video game ever according to certain definitions. In the 1950s, Arthur Samuel created one of the first board game-playing programs of any kind. More recently, in 2007 scientists at the University of Alberta developed their " Chinook " program to the point where it is unbeatable. A brute force approach that took hundreds of computers working nearly two decades

2870-455: The game board but do not necessarily enforce the game's rules, leaving this up to the players. There are generalized programs such as Vassal , Tabletop Simulator and Tabletopia that can be used to play any board or card game, while programs like Roll20 and Fantasy Grounds are more specialized for role-playing games. Some of these virtual tabletops have worked with the license holders to allow for use of their game's assets within

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2940-437: The game from English speakers), checkers is called dame , dames , damas , or a similar term that refers to ladies. The pieces are usually called men , stones , "peón" (pawn) or a similar term; men promoted to kings are called dames or ladies. In these languages, the queen in chess or in card games is usually called by the same term as the kings in checkers. A case in point includes the Greek terminology, in which checkers

3010-455: The game is a draw. In an ending with three kings versus one king, the player with three kings must win in thirteen moves or the game is a draw. There is also a 10×8 board variant (with two additional columns labelled i and k ) and the give-away variant Poddavki . There are official championships for shashki and its variants. 10x10 15 With this rule, there is no draw with two kings versus one. Slovak draughts 10x10? 15? 8 It

3080-428: The game. Board game Board games are tabletop games that typically use pieces . These pieces are moved or placed on a pre-marked game board (playing surface) and often include elements of table , card , role-playing , and miniatures games as well. Many board games feature a competition between two or more players. To give a few examples: in checkers (British English name 'draughts'),

3150-427: The game. American checkers (English draughts) has been the arena for several notable advances in game artificial intelligence . In 1951 Christopher Strachey wrote the first video game program on checkers. The checkers program tried to run for the first time on 30 July 1951 at NPL, but was unsuccessful due to program errors. In the summer of 1952 he successfully ran the program on Ferranti Mark 1 computer and played

3220-454: The growth of the board game market at "between 25% and 40% annually" since 2010, and described the current time as the "golden era for board games". The rise in board game popularity has been attributed to quality improvement (more elegant mechanics , components , artwork, and graphics) as well as increased availability thanks to sales through the Internet. Crowd-sourcing for board games

3290-453: The maze to kill or move a living chief or a chief corpse, the piece must make an additional move immediately, in order to leave the maze. The original rule humoristically states that it is done to avoid things like an assassin empowered in the maze. It is done in this order : This order of actions allows placing the chief/corpse between the maze and the new position of the acting piece. There can be informal agreements or alliances between

3360-601: The most complex game ever solved . In November 1983, the Science Museum Oklahoma (then called the Omniplex) unveiled a new exhibit: Lefty the Checker Playing Robot. Programmed by Scott M Savage, Lefty used an Armdroid robotic arm by Colne Robotics and was powered by a 6502 processor with a combination of Basic and Assembly code to interactively play a round of checkers with visitors to the museum. Originally,

3430-430: The necessity for two pieces to cooperate to capture one, although, like Ghanaian draughts, the game could still be declared lost by a player with only one piece left. An Arabic game called Quirkat or al-qirq , with similar play to modern checkers, was played on a 5×5 board. It is mentioned in the tenth-century work Kitab al-Aghani . Al qirq was also the name for the game that is now called nine men's morris . Al qirq

3500-838: The number or complexity of rules; for example, chess or Go possess relatively simple rulesets but have great strategic depth. Classical board games are divided into four categories: race games (such as pachisi ), space games (such as noughts and crosses ), chase games (such as hnefatafl ), and games of displacement (such as chess ). Board games have been played, traveled, and evolved in most cultures and societies throughout history. Several important historical sites, artifacts, and documents shed light on early board games such as Jiroft civilization game boards in Iran. Senet , found in Predynastic and First Dynasty burials of Egypt, c.  3500 BC and 3100 BC respectively,

3570-474: The object is to arrange the pieces into some special configuration), chase games (asymmetrical games, where players start the game with different sets of pieces and objectives) and displace games (where the main objective is the capture the opponents' pieces). Parlett also distinguishes between abstract and thematic games, the latter having a specific theme or frame narrative (ex. regular chess versus, for example, Star Wars -themed chess). The following

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3640-419: The opponent's pieces. A move consists of moving a piece forward to an adjacent unoccupied square. If the adjacent square contains an opponent's piece, and the square immediately beyond it is vacant, the piece may be captured (and removed from the game) by jumping over it. Only the dark squares of the checkerboard are used. A piece can only move forward into an unoccupied square. When capturing an opponent's piece

3710-467: The opponents' moves, while others use email to notify the players after each move. The Internet and cheaper home printing has also influenced board games via print-and-play games that may be purchased and printed. Some games use external media such as audio cassettes or DVDs in accompaniment to the game. There are also virtual tabletop programs that allow online players to play a variety of existing and new board games through tools needed to manipulate

3780-402: The player has no pieces left, or if all the player's pieces are obstructed from moving by opponent pieces. An uncrowned piece ( man ) moves one step ahead and captures an adjacent opponent's piece by jumping over it and landing on the next square. Multiple enemy pieces can be captured in a single turn provided this is done by successive jumps made by a single piece; the jumps do not need to be in

3850-411: The players, but there is no rule to prevent any betrayal. The game ends when a player has killed the chiefs of all of the other players. The pieces of the missing fourth player are "hostages". These pieces can be killed or moved by the pieces of the players. When the chief is captured, the normal rules to take control of them apply. The hostage chief can be placed in the maze, but it has no influence on

3920-401: The program was deliberately simple so that the average museum visitor could potentially win, but over time was improved. The improvements however proved to be more frustrating for the visitors, so the original code was reimplemented. Generalized Checkers is played on an M × N board. It is PSPACE-hard to determine whether a specified player has a winning strategy. And if a polynomial bound

3990-417: The program; for example, Fantasy Grounds has licenses for both Dungeons & Dragons and Pathfinder materials, while Tabletop Simulator allows game publishers to provide paid downloadable content for their games. However, as these games offer the ability to add in the content through user modifications , there are also unlicensed uses of board game assets available through these programs. While

4060-586: The psychology of older board games (e.g., chess , Go , mancala ), less has been done on contemporary board games such as Monopoly , Scrabble , and Risk , and especially modern board games such as Catan , Agricola , and Pandemic . Much research has been carried out on chess, partly because many tournament players are publicly ranked in national and international lists, which makes it possible to compare their levels of expertise. The works of Adriaan de Groot , William Chase, Herbert A. Simon , and Fernand Gobet have established that knowledge, more than

4130-437: The same line and may "zigzag" (change diagonal direction). In American checkers, men can jump only forwards; in international draughts and Russian draughts , men can jump both forwards and backwards. When a man reaches the farthest row forward, known as the kings row or crown head , it becomes a king . It is marked by placing an additional piece on top of, or crowning , the first man. The king has additional powers, namely

4200-456: The unoccupied squares immediately beyond it. Because jumped pieces remain on the board until the turn is complete, it is possible to reach a position in a multi-jump move where the flying king is blocked from capturing further by a piece already jumped. Flying kings are not used in American checkers; a king's only advantage over a man is the additional ability to move and capture backwards. In most non-English languages (except those that acquired

4270-462: The very simple, such as in snakes and ladders ; to deeply complex, as in Advanced Squad Leader . Play components now often include custom figures or shaped counters, and distinctively shaped player pieces commonly known as meeples as well as traditional cards and dice. The time required to learn or master gameplay varies greatly from game to game, but is not necessarily related to

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4340-436: Was weakly solved in 2007 by a team of Canadian computer scientists led by Jonathan Schaeffer . From the standard starting position, perfect play by each side would result in a draw. Checkers is played by two opponents on opposite sides of the game board. One player has dark pieces (usually black); the other has light pieces (usually white or red). The darker color moves first, then players alternate turns. A player cannot move

4410-721: Was brought to Spain by the Moors , where it became known as Alquerque , the Spanish derivation of the Arabic name. It was maybe adapted into a derivation of latrunculi , or the game of the Little Soldiers, with a leaping capture, which, like modern Argentine, German, Greek and Thai draughts, had flying kings which had to stop on the next square after the captured piece, but pieces could only make up to three captures at once, or seven if all directions were legal. That said, even if playing al qirq inside

4480-426: Was considered to be the best market per capita, with the highest number of games sold per individual. Some academics, such as Erica Price and Marco Arnaudo, have differentiated "hobby" board games and gamers from other board games and gamers. A 2014 estimate placed the U.S. and Canada market for hobby board games (games produced for a "gamer" market) at only $ 75 million, with the total size of what it defined as

4550-566: Was found in the royal tombs of Ur, dating to Mesopotamia 4,600 years ago. Board games have a long tradition in Europe. The oldest records of board gaming in Europe date back to Homer 's Iliad (written in the 8th century BC), in which he mentions the Ancient Greek game of petteia . This game of petteia would later evolve into the Roman ludus latrunculorum . Board gaming in ancient Europe

4620-503: Was introduced in France in around 1535, at which point the game became known as Jeu forcé , identical to modern American checkers. The game without forced capture became known as Le jeu plaisant de dames , the precursor of international checkers. The 18th-century English author Samuel Johnson wrote a foreword to a 1756 book about checkers by William Payne , the earliest book in English about

4690-688: Was not unique to the Greco-Roman world, with records estimating that the ancient Norse game of hnefatafl was developed sometime before 400 AD . In ancient Ireland, the game of fidchell or ficheall , is said to date back to at least 144 AD, though this is likely an anachronism. A fidchell board dating from the 10th century has been uncovered in Co. Westmeath, Ireland. In the United Kingdom, association of dice and cards with gambling led to all dice games except backgammon being treated as lotteries by dice in

4760-521: Was one of the most prolific publishers of board games of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. John Betts' A Tour of the British Colonies and Foreign Possessions and William Spooner's A Voyage of Discovery were popular in the British empire. Kriegsspiel is a genre of wargaming developed in 19th century Prussia to teach battle tactics to officers. The board game Travellers' Tour Through

4830-505: Was placing two pieces on either side of the opponent's piece. It was said to have been played during the Trojan War . The Romans played a derivation of petteia called latrunculi , or the game of the Little Soldiers. The pieces, and sporadically the game itself, were called calculi ( pebbles ). Like the pawn in Chess , Alquerque was probably derived from πεττεία and latrunculi by removing

4900-460: Was used to solve the game, showing that a game of checkers will always end in a draw if neither player makes a mistake. The solution is for the checkers variation called go-as-you-please (GAYP) checkers and not for the variation called three-move restriction checkers, however it is a legal three-move restriction game because only openings believed to lose are barred under the three-move restriction. As of December 2007, this makes American checkers

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