Crokinole is a disk-flicking dexterity board game, possibly of Canadian origin, similar to the games of pitchnut, carrom, and pichenotte, with elements of shuffleboard and curling reduced to table-top size. Players take turns shooting discs across the circular playing surface, trying to land their discs in the higher-scoring regions of the board, particularly the recessed center hole of 20 points, while also attempting to knock opposing discs off the board, and into the 'ditch'. In crokinole, the shooting is generally towards the center of the board, unlike carroms and pitchnut, where the shooting is towards the four outer corner pockets, as in pool. Crokinole is also played using cue sticks, and there is a special category for cue stick participants at the World Crokinole Championships in Tavistock, Ontario, Canada.
Shogi, also known as Japanese chess or the Game of Generals, is a two-player strategy board game that is the Japanese variant of chess. It is the most popular chess variant in Japan. Shōgi means general's board game.
Steve Jackson Games (SJGames) is a game company, founded in 1980 by Steve Jackson, that creates and publishes role-playing, board, and card games, and the gaming magazine Pyramid.
Stratego is a strategy board game for two players on a board of 10×10 squares. Each player controls 40 pieces representing individual officer and soldier ranks in an army. The pieces have Napoleonic insignia. The objective of the game is to find and capture the opponent's Flag, or to capture so many enemy pieces that the opponent cannot make any further moves. Stratego has simple enough rules for young children to play but a depth of strategy that is also appealing to adults. The game is a slightly modified copy of an early 20th century French game named L'Attaque. It has been in production in Europe since World War II and the United States since 1961. There are now two- and four-handed versions, versions with 10, 30 or 40 pieces per player, and boards with smaller sizes. There are also variant pieces and different rulesets.
Risk is a strategy board game of diplomacy, conflict and conquest for two to six players. The standard version is played on a board depicting a political map of the world, divided into forty-two territories, which are grouped into six continents. Turns rotate among players who control armies of playing pieces with which they attempt to capture territories from other players, with results determined by dice rolls. Players may form and dissolve alliances during the course of the game. The goal of the game is to occupy every territory on the board and, in doing so, eliminate the other players. The game can be lengthy, requiring several hours to multiple days to finish. European versions are structured so that each player has a limited "secret mission" objective that shortens the game.
Trivial Pursuit is a board game from Canada in which winning is determined by a player's ability to answer general knowledge and popular culture questions. Players move their pieces around a board, the squares they land on determining the subject of a question they are asked from a card. Each correct answer allows the player's turn to continue; a correct answer on one of the six "category headquarters" spaces earns a plastic wedge which is slotted into the answerer's playing piece. The object of the game is to collect all six wedges from each "category headquarters" space, and then return to the center "hub" space to answer a question in a category selected by the other players.
Titan is a fantasy board game for two to six players, designed by Jason B. McAllister and David A. Trampier. It was first published in 1980 by Gorgonstar, a small company created by the designers. Soon afterward, the rights were licensed to Avalon Hill, which made several minor revisions and published the game for many years. Titan went out of print in 1998, when Avalon Hill was sold and ceased operations. A new edition of Titan, with artwork by Kurt Miller and Mike Doyle and produced by Canadian publisher Valley Games became available in late 2008. The Valley Games edition was adapted to the Apple iPad and released on December 21, 2011.
Civilization is a board game designed by Francis Tresham, published in the United Kingdom in 1980 by Hartland Trefoil, and in the US in 1981 by Avalon Hill. The Civilization brand is now owned by Hasbro. It was out of print for many years, before Gibsons Games republished it in 2018.
Liubo is an ancient Chinese board game played by two players. For the rules, it is believed that each player had six game pieces that were moved around the points of a square game board that had a distinctive, symmetrical pattern. Moves were determined by the throw of six sticks, which performed the same function as dice in other race games.
Trouble is a board game in which players compete to be the first to send four pieces all the way around a board. Pieces are moved according to the roll of a die. Trouble was developed by Evan Hill and initially manufactured by Dalz., later by Milton Bradley. The game was launched in America in 1965. The classic version is now marketed by Winning Moves Games USA.
Carcassonne is a tile-based German-style board game for two to five players, designed by Klaus-Jürgen Wrede and published in 2000 by Hans im Glück in German and by Rio Grande Games and Z-Man Games (currently) in English. It received the Spiel des Jahres and the Deutscher Spiele Preis awards in 2001.
Space Hulk is a board game for two players by Games Workshop. It was released in 1989. The game is set in the fictional universe of Warhammer 40,000. In the game, a "space hulk" is a mass of ancient, derelict space ships, asteroids, and other assorted space debris. One player takes the role of Space Marine Terminators, superhuman elite soldiers who have been sent to investigate such a space hulk. The other player takes the role of Tyranid Genestealers, an aggressive alien species which have made their home aboard such masses.
Ticket to Ride is a railway-themed German-style board game designed by Alan R. Moon. It was illustrated by Julien Delval and Cyrille Daujean and published in 2004 by Days of Wonder. The game is also known as Zug um Zug (German), Les Aventuriers du Rail (French), Aventureros al Tren (Spanish), Wsiąść do pociągu (Polish), and Menolippu (Finnish).
Evo: The Last Gasp of the Dinosaurs is a German-style board game for three to five players, designed by Philippe Keyaerts and published by Eurogames. The game won the GAMES Magazine award for Game of the year 2002. It was nominated for the Origins Award for Best Graphic Presentation of a Board Game 2000. In 2004 it was nominated for the Hra Roku. The game went out of print in 2007, and a second edition was released in 2011.
Pichenotte refers to a family of several disk-flicking games, mostly French Canadian in origin, including crokinole, carrom, and pitchnut, which may sometimes be played with small cue sticks. Pichenotte is a Canadian French word meaning 'flick', which is derived from the European French word pichenette, also meaning 'flick'. These folk games are in the public domain, and are not subject to copyright like a commercial board game. Nor are they patented games. However, the names Pichenotte and Pitchnut are registered trademarks in the United States. "Crokinole is a popular Canadian board game also commonly called pichenotte." "The carrom game throughout Quebec is known as 'pichenotte'" The game community site Knipsbrat.com states that, like the German name Knipsbrat ('flicking-board'), "pichenotte is another name for crokinole" The Canadian game board collection at the Quebec Museum of Civilization in Quebec City includes both the square carrom-type board and the round crokinole-type game Crokinole is also called 'pichenotte' throughout much of North America; modern-day tournaments have been held as far apart as Tavistock, Ontario, and Santa Fe and Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Pitchnut is a wooden tabletop game of French Canadian origins, similar to carrom, crokinole and pichenotte, with mechanics that lie somewhere between pocket billiards and air hockey. Unlike with other wooden board games, there are no records of pitchnut being mass-produced; all existing boards are handmade. Pitchnut is not a patented game. It is in the public domain. The name Pitchnut is a registered trademark by Lee Larcheveque, who coined and trademarked the name. In French-speaking areas of Canada, the game is called pichenotte, which is French for 'flick'. There are several other disk-flicking games which are also referred to as 'pichenotte' by French speakers. Many modern boards are in use, made mostly by Lee Larcheveque, and before him, by Achille Scalabrini, in Sainte-Edwidge-de-Clifton, Quebec, Canada. The game is common on the farming villages near Coaticook, Quebec, Canada and in Amherst, Massachusetts, United States.
Agricola is a Euro-style board game created by Uwe Rosenberg. It is a worker placement game with a focus on resource management. In Agricola, players are farmers that sow, plow the fields, collect wood, build stables, buy animals, expand their farms and feed their families. After 14 rounds players calculate their score based on the size and prosperity of the household.
CirKis is a piece placing board game, for two to four players, invented by Phil E. Orbanes and developed by Winning Moves Games USA in 2008. However, the game is no longer in production. The game is based on a Penrose tiling.
This page explains commonly used terms in board games in alphabetical order. For a list of board games, see List of board games. For terms specific to chess, see Glossary of chess. For terms related to chess problems, see Glossary of chess problems.
The following is a glossary of terms used in tables games. Terms in this glossary should not be game-specific, but apply to a range of tables games.
