A game is simply a structured type of play, normally undertaken for fun or entertainment, and occasionally used as an educational resource. Games are very different from work, which frequently is carried out merely for recreation, and from literature, which is essentially more of an artistic expression or philosophical elements. Game studies generally focus on the various patterns and systems by which we interact with the world around us.
The main article discusses these broad approaches to game study. The main article covers dice, which seems like a simple idea, but it isn’t until you understand its underlying mechanics that you start to see the uses for dice in games outside of the dice board game. When you start to examine the mechanics of games other than the classic board game, you can begin to see the importance of dice in our everyday lives.
One of the earliest games involving dice is chess. Chess involves placement of pieces on a board, each of which possesses a certain number of capabilities, or “positions”. You can move a piece on any row or column at any time, and that position will lock that piece into place until the current position is removed. The piece may also be moved diagonally, horizontally, or vertically. Although there are more elaborate chess systems than I will detail here, the basic approach of placing pieces on a row and checking them all off when the current one is moved is the same. This is the simplest of the three main rules of chess, and we shall see this again in later articles.
The next type of game piece we’ll discuss is the playing card, which serve no purpose other than to facilitate movement, but it must be kept within a specified range. If you are playing a game with more than two game pieces, you have the option of using playing cards of more than one color. This increases your options for tactical planning. However, it also means you have to keep track of multiple sets of cards at once, a very cumbersome task. In addition, cards played by kings usually do not count towards your winning score.
The final major category of game pieces, we’ll cover are those used in chess. The pawn, the queen, the knight, the rook, and the bishop all have important strategic roles, and each player must assign value to them based upon their positioning on the chess board. Although these pieces are sometimes called “life” pieces, that word is somewhat misleading. They are only a part of your “life”, and their value is determined by how long they remain on the board. Pawns are usually the lowest valued game piece, and their value declines rapidly as other stronger players remove them from the board. The bishop is the highest value of these game pieces, but he is also susceptible to being removed from the board.
If you’ve never played a real life game of chess, or if you’d rather avoid the intricacies of this ancient game, don’t worry. Many computer games use an optimized version of the original game as the basis for their strategy. (The same goes for video games based on books or movies.) The main article related to strategic board games will explain how to play a game of chess using a minimally invasive, yet comprehensive strategy program. You’ll be able to see all of the best moves, learn how to dominate your opponent, and feel like you’re actually playing a real live game!