Designer: Bernard Tahitian
Each player is given a collection of pieces resembling Tetris shapes. They place their first piece in the corner closest to them. After that, each piece they place must connect diagonally to one of their other pieces, but must lay flat on the board and may not share an edge with any of their own pieces. The winner is based on the number and size of pieces they are ultimately unable to place.
Blokus is an attractive, inviting experience and takes less than 5 minutes to teach even non-gamers. It’s also surprisingly aggressive, and yet is abstract and friendly enough where opponents will frequently help each other find places to play their last piece. The biggest problem with Blokus is that the game simply doesn’t work well except as a four player game.
Key Mechanic: Diagonal adjacency. It seems simple, but this provides a lot of depth to the game, and results in some pieces you wouldn’t expect being unusually powerful – the U-shaped piece for being able to close off an opponent’s expansion opportunities, and the single square for being the primary way to sneak into enemy territory.
(Photo Credit: Toys R Us)
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