The Game of the Generals, also called GG or GOG as it is most fondly called, or simply The Generals, is an educational war game invented in the Philip...
The Game of the Generals, also called GG or GOG as it is most fondly called, or simply The Generals, is an educational war game invented in the Philippines by Sofronio H. Pasola Jr. in 1970. Its Filipino name is "Salpakan." It can be played within twenty to thirty minutes. It is designed for two players, each controlling an army, and a neutral arbiter (sometimes called a referee or an adjutant) to decide the results of "challenges" between opposing playing pieces, that like playing cards, have their identities hidden from the opponent.
The game simulates armies at war trying to overpower, misinform, outflank, outmaneuver, and destroy each other. It optimizes the use of logic, memory, and spatial skills. It simulates the "fog of war" because the identities of the opposing pieces are hidden from each player and can only be guessed at by their location, movements, or from the results of challenges. The game allows only one side's plan to succeed, although a player may change plans during the course of the game. In addition, there are two different ways of winning the game (see below). Certain strategies and tactics, however, allow both sides the chance of securing a better idea of the other's plan as the game progresses. Players can also speak or gesture to their opponents during matches, hoping to create a false impression about the identity of their pieces or their overall strategy.
This game was invented by Sofronio H. Pasola, Jr. with the inspiration of his son Ronnie Pasola.
The Pasolas first tried the Game of the Generals on a chessboard. Even then, the pieces had no particular arrangement. There were no spies in the experimental game; but after Ronnie Pasola remembered the James Bond movies and Mata Hari, he added the Spies. Making the pieces hidden was the idea of the Pasolas after remembering card games.
The Game of the Generals' public introduction was on February 28, 1973. After the game was made, it angered many Filipino chess players thinking that Pasola was trying to denigrate or supplant chess.
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SECTOR 41
Sector 41 is a board game published by David Long and Michael Lachtanski of Scimitar Games. The game became available for pre-order in February 2009 a...
Sector 41 is a board game published by David Long and Michael Lachtanski of Scimitar Games. The game became available for pre-order in February 2009 and was officially released in April 2009.
Sector 41 is a turn-based strategy game for two to four players. Game play takes place on a 9×9 grid of face-down tiles, randomly shuffled at the beginning of each game. Players control one mother ship which moves along the edge of the game board. Mother ships can deploy up to three explorer ships onto the face-down grid. Explorer ships are used to discover, mine, and tow deposits of Glynium to their mother ship. According to the game background, Glynium is an unstable power source only found in this sector. Victory is achieved when one player has mined more Glynium than any other player could match. In the case of a tie, the first person to reach that score is declared the victor.
Sector 41 was developed from a compilation of game concepts developed by David Long and Michael Lachtanski, the earliest of which go back to the mid-1990s. The name itself is an homage to the popular Area 51 science fiction theme. Play testing began in late 2007 and lasted until production began in late fall of 2008. The face-down tile set up was conceived of to emulate the fog of war mechanism, popular in many computer games. The developers also encourage players to strategically manipulate the board layout for offensive and defensive purposes through the process of "folding space". This game mechanism was inspired by the Dune novels.
The lengthy play time in the initial play testing lead developers to create the Guardian figure. The Guardian, described below, acts as a mechanism for rewarding exploration, expansion, and reduced play time dramatically. Additional rules for modifying the Guardian's role in gameplay are available on the Scimitar Games website. Michael Lachtanski designed the game's graphics. Many of the space graphics are based on images from NASA.
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