The Game You Already Know How to Play
Designed by Mark Alan Osterhaus, Ellen Osterhaus Max Osterhaus
Published by Out of the Box GamesTake Chess, the classic game that all of us in gaming grew up playing. Add in some whimsical art by industry veteran (and Murphy's Rules artist) John Kovalic. Stir in a healthy dose of playing cards. Mix thoroughly. What you get is Bosworth, "The Game You Already Know How to Play."
The basics of Bosworth are chess. There are the same number of pieces as regular chess (represented with cards), and they move the same way (by and large) as in regular chess. Where the game differs is in the board, and in the set up.
The board is a six by six grid, (chess is normally eight by eight). The four corner spaCces are not used in play at all. You place four of the cards on your end of the board and go from there. During the course of the game, you eventually have to place your King. Once your king is captured (there is no check in this game), you have lost.
Some of the moves from chess don't happen in this game. I'd already mentioned that there is no check (mostly because the board is so small it would make it extremely difficult to move). There is also no en passant or castling.
The game plays very quickly. At Origins, the demos they ran went very quickly, and all involved appeared to be having a good time. They ran quite a few people through those demos, and I'd suspect the majority of them picked up the game.
. . .This article originally appeared in the second volume of Pyramid. See the current Pyramid website for more information.
Article publication date: July 31, 1998
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