Game: Travel Blokus

Thread: Re: Travel Blokus Review after a weekend away

Corbain — 2008-07-11T07:13:13+00:00

pastabatman wrote:

Edit: I should add though, that there is a plus side to having the box when no flat space is available. Each player can use the top or bottom of the box to lay out their pieces.

Unfortunaltey the European/UK edition does not have the seperable box, it is an all in one, sleeve type box.

The game certainly does travel better than many games, its small, light and the game pieces are sturdy. If they have just spent 5% more on materials, design and packaging, this would have been nigh on "the" perfect Travel game.

Thread: Re: Travel Blokus Review after a weekend away

Gamegrunt — 2008-07-11T04:35:26+00:00

This is my copy on a vacation to San Antonio after a day at Sea World.

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Grandma and I played some TB while the grandkids frolicked in the indoor pool. Is this not the essence of games that travel?

Gg

Thread: Re: Travel Blokus Review after a weekend away

feldmafx — 2008-07-10T20:38:17+00:00

Is a travel game one that you can play while travelling, or one that is easy to transport and play at your destination? Some games accomplish both, but I tend to think of the second criteria for a "travel" game. For instance, Hive is great to take with you, but playing it while travelling wouldn't work well.

Travel Blokus works this way as well - which makes it a good travel game to me.

Thread: Re: Travel Blokus Review after a weekend away

elmonty — 2008-07-10T20:30:41+00:00

We tried playing this on an airplane last month. I prefer to spread out my pieces so that I can see all their shapes, and this just isn't possible on an airplane. Then, one small knee bump to the tray table and all the pieces went all over the floor. We couldn't find them all until after everyone else deboarded the plane after landing.

Great game? Yes. For travel? No.

Thread: Re: Travel Blokus Review after a weekend away

pastabatman — 2008-07-10T19:15:18+00:00

dedbob wrote:
The fact that the game is not some kind of self-contained portable package does not detract from my enjoyment of the game at all, as I don't think there was anything about the game's representation that would have led me to believe it was something it wasn't.
I'll side with Bob on this. Sure, a smaller version is more travel-friendly. But most products that are named a 'travel' version of another prodcut are not only smaller, but do not require rubber bands to keep them closed, and don't use cardboard for the external case. The fact that this deficiency doesn't detract from the gameplay itself is irrelevant.

Edit: I should add though, that there is a plus side to having the box when no flat space is available. Each player can use the top or bottom of the box to lay out their pieces.

Thread: Re: Travel Blokus Review after a weekend away

dedbob — 2008-07-10T17:42:22+00:00

In my opinion, the "Travel" really just refers to the fact that -- compared to the original Blokus -- the pieces are a bit smaller, along with the smaller play area, results in a substantially smaller box which is suitable to tuck into a large purse or bag. Also, the interlocking storage trays allow each player to keep all their pieces conveniently at hand without needing a bunch of extra table space, while also keeping the pieces from spilling all over the place when stored in the box.

The fact that the game is not some kind of self-contained portable package does not detract from my enjoyment of the game at all, as I don't think there was anything about the game's representation that would have led me to believe it was something it wasn't.

Thread: Travel Blokus Review after a weekend away

Corbain — 2008-07-10T08:37:20+00:00

Travel Blokus is a two-player abstract strategy game played on a square grid. Both players attempt to lay their diversely-shaped pieces with the aim of covering as much of the playing surface with their chosen colour, and preventing their opponent from doing the same.

What's in the box?

The UK edition has an all-in-one box which contains the grey playing surface underneath which there are two plastic trays each holding the playing pieces for each side: orange and purple. S rules sheet on a square piece of paper slips neatly onto the slightly concave playing surface, maing it easy to slide the whole game into the box.

The board is quite sturdy and of sufficent weight to be stable, but the plastic storage trays are very flimsy, do not "lock" together or to the underside of the board, meaning that to transport the game around, it has to be inside the box. I understand this is different for the US verson

Ease of learning

Like most abstract strategy games, this one is fairly simple to pick up, but this belies relatively complex gameplay possibilities. After reading through the rules once the player should be rapidly able to get into their first game without having to look at the rules ever again. Only the Strategy section is worth reviewing again. To me this was a sign of a simple game well explained by the rules.

Gameplay and Strategy

Players take it in turns to lay their pieces on the board, with the only stipulation being that pieces of the same colour can touch only at the corners. To acheive the aim of laying the most pieces on the board a couple of strategies present themselves.

- Placing your pieces up close to your opponent's to deny them corner adjacency where they can place their own pieces

- Isolating your opponent from sections of the board to give yourself wide open spaces with freedom to place your pieces at will

Tactically, it is a good idea to get a feel of which pieces fit well together, so that when your oppenent lays a particular piece you can try to manouver into a position to take advantage of it. Since the aim of the game is to lay as many of your pieces as possible, both players will be trying to leave as much open spaces as possible and will , much like tetris, be trying to place pieces together with as few gaps as possible.

- keep an eye on your opponents remaining pieces
- learn which pieces interconnect well (remember, the closer you lay your pieces to your opponents, the more of their corners become useless)

A game should last about 15-20 minutes.

Portability

As mentioned above, the flimsy plastic containers make trasporting the game outside of its box impossible. If the board and storage trays would lock together then it would be a huge improvement.

The nature of the game is that you will often need to spread out your remaining pieces while deciding your next move, so a reasonably sized flat surface is pretty much a pre-requisite.

Although the pieces are not magnetic they slot in to the raised grid edges on the board, and don't slide around. You could play this on an airplane or train, and only very serious turbulance or braking would upset the board.

Conclusion

Travel Blokus/Blokus Duo is an excellent two player game suitable for play whilst travelling as long as there is a flat surface available. I suspect that further strategies and tactics will open up as I play the game more. It is not as deep as Chess or Go, but has easily got a high replayability for the average gamer, and could be a gateway game onto other abstract strategies or themed games.

I deduct half a point for being less portable than a Travel marketed game should be.

7/10

Thread: Re: Travel Blokus?

Corbain — 2008-07-09T11:12:04+00:00

Well, I've had a chance to play it on holiday, and despite the above mentioned limitations, it's a fantastic game!

Thread: Re: Travel Blokus?

Skadar — 2008-07-03T15:34:41+00:00

Yeah, the US version that we appear to have comes in a traditional, sturdy game box with a top and bottom. It sounds like they are getting cheap with the new packaging.

Thread: Re: Travel Blokus?

unixrevolution — 2008-07-03T13:27:12+00:00

Corbain wrote:
Perhaps the US edition has a different box. My edition has an all in one box where you have to slide the game+storage containers into the top by the narrow side. You cannot separate the box out to a top and bottom section, which I agree, would go some way to compensating this.

Sounds like a much different box than what i've got.

Thread: Re: Travel Blokus?

Corbain — 2008-07-03T12:58:02+00:00

Perhaps the US edition has a different box. My edition has an all in one box where you have to slide the game+storage containers into the top by the narrow side. You cannot separate the box out to a top and bottom section, which I agree, would go some way to compensating this.

Thread: Re: Travel Blokus?

jimmcmahon — 2008-07-03T12:44:26+00:00

Seeing as the gameboard is roughly the exact size as the box, I just bring the box. The top lid and box bottom make great piece-holders.

Jim

Thread: Travel Blokus?

Corbain — 2008-07-03T11:28:31+00:00

Was the reason they renamed this from Travel Blokus to Blokus Duo the ludicrously flimsy undercarriage storage trays?

They are made from the kind of bendy, tearable plastic you might find molded into a small tub for cress, or a particularly weak egg carton. The interlocking system is non existent, and it would be quite awkward to play anywhere where there isn't a reasonably sized stable flat surface to play on.

If they would have at least made the storage trays using a sturdier plastic, and made them lockable to the underside of the board (and each other) then you would have a great travel game that could be quite easily played on a train/bus/coach just resting on an armrest or your lap.

I was slightly dissapointed in the components, and would hesitate to recommend this as a travel game (and I haven't even played it yet!). I was just packing my suitcase for a holiday, took Blokus Duo out of the box for the first time and realised that the storage trays would probably get destroyed in transit!

Thread: Re: Play Blokus Duo on Blokus Classic board

origamifreak — 2008-05-06T03:25:19+00:00

Works just fine. I've marked my full-size Blokus board to accomodate Universe (purple lines) as well as Travel Blokus (black lines).

Here's a game I played against TerminusEst last weekend:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=1992462613989675477&...
(I was red)

Thread: Re: Leading off the session

daw65 — 2008-04-28T00:21:17+00:00

I wasn't playing this particular game, and I've only played Travel Blokus once (and original Blokus only once, as well), so I really couldn't say. Sorry.

Image

OldestManOnMySpace — 2008-03-17T02:32:21+00:00

A closeup of a game of Travel Blokus from above.

Thread: Re: Broken?

RPardoe — 2008-02-17T00:17:09+00:00

In fact - taking just both of the squares in the 2x2 on the diagonal connecting the opening spaces should be enough. But then again, I intentionally play to get close to my opponent trying to hem them in. The rear areas I can develop later - especially if my opponent has built into them leaving them wide open for me.

Thread: Re: Broken?

SpaceCowboy — 2008-02-17T00:09:21+00:00

Ahh that makes sense. We only tried this one time, and by the time I realized it would be a problem I had already accidentally created a scenario where I couldn't break into her territory. That makes sense. Thanks!

Thread: Re: Broken?

RPardoe — 2008-02-16T19:58:48+00:00

One of the things I like about Travel Blokus is that the players start closer together so come into contact much more quickly than in Blokus. As a result, it is easy to counter this symmetrical approach rather easily. In fact, it can be done on the second move of the game. The key is to take at least one square that your opponent needs to respond symetrically. So as you build towards the center - take all four center squares on the board:

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How does your opponent mirror this move?

Thread: Re: Broken?

SpaceCowboy — 2008-02-16T18:24:33+00:00

Yeah, I kept trying to do moves that would result in asymetry, but I was either not thinking far enough ahead or it didn't matter. I think a simple solution to this is simply to start with different pieces.

Thread: Re: Broken?

Gilby — 2008-02-16T03:48:18+00:00

houjix wrote:
Something does feel inherantly solvable Travel Blokus, doesn't it?

I'm not entirely sure if this is a problem or not (not exactly worth the brainpower on a Friday night) but would a simple solution be to prohibit the second player's first move from being the exact same piece that the first player just placed?

Wouldn't it be possible to make a move that makes an mirrored move impossible?

Thread: Re: Broken?

ColtsFan76 — 2008-02-16T03:07:24+00:00

You should have tried the time-tested "I know you are but what am I?" defense.

Thread: Broken?

SpaceCowboy — 2008-02-16T03:02:37+00:00

So, I was playing with my mom tonight, and, becoming frustrated at losing, she decided to mirror every move I made during one game. I can't see a way that this doesn't end in a draw every time. I'm not sure about regular blokus, but I assume that since you are moving towards each other that ultimately you would reach a point where someone would claim the center first and a mirror move would be impossible.

Is there a way to break a draw if someone is copying your every move? I was intrigued that such a simple strategy seemed to have no counter, but with every piece I placed, I couldn't think of how to throw her off.

Thread: Re: Are we that dumb? Bee honest.

jollypirate — 2008-02-10T17:19:40+00:00

Thanks!

I have been known to totally screw-up the game play, though I though this was a little too simple for even yours truly to pervert.

Thread: Re: Are we that dumb? Bee honest.

3ripmav — 2008-02-10T16:21:12+00:00

The scoring mechanism is odd, as most games will leave most, if not all, players with negative points. It seems counter-intuitive for a game to treat the players so "harshly," but if you let that go it works itself out.

In the two player version, I've logged about 20-25 plays and have only played all my pieces once for sure, maybe twice. It is a tight fit, and rarely does your opponent make enough back-to-back mistakes to allow you the room to place all your pieces. Coupled to the no touching your own pieces, and only having one other color to snuggle up against (trying to revive your "playing with women" time... ;o), its very difficult to get all the pieces on the board.

In contrast, with the four player game, I've probably played 40-50 games, and I have played all my pieces about 25-30% of the time. And I have placed my single as my final piece about 3-5 times. It is still difficult, but multiple players playing with their own objectives give you more opportunity and there is also the element of hugging all the other colors, which gives you a lot more play space on the board.

No, you are not dumb (as far as I would know ;o) as your experience is the norm, but some of those scores were a bit high, play more and you'll get them down to single digits. Don't expect perfect games, they are few and far between. Play with the objective to be "who gets the least negative score..." The other option is treating it like a low score is bad, and counting the points backwards... left-overs are positive points that you DON"T want, like Hearts, placing all your pieces is zero and playing the single last is like shooting the moon.

Thread: Are we that dumb? Bee honest.

jollypirate — 2008-02-10T12:05:00+00:00

I've played this now 5 times, and I don't mind bragging that it was with 2 DIFFERENT girls.

So some of you may think that, yes, Jollypirate is already a winner, but unfortunately, I am not so sure.

The first two plays were in Australia while waiting out the midday heat (42 or 107 degrees depending on your ranking system) in the Grampians. I won handily by having less negative points against my lovely female hostess Amanda.

The next two plays (a month and a week later) didn't go my way, being edged out in a Dunkin' Donuts in South Korea on a warm winter day (55 or 13) by my friend Chilane, whom I believe I've already mentioned is also a female. The first game I had -16 to her -14, and the next I had -14 to her -13.

The final game with Chilane actually had me roping her into a small area and not almost roping her off and then having her wrap her pieces around mine (Is it just me, or is it hot in here?) like in the previous games. But I couldn't convert to a positive score. I wound up with a -6 to her -18, but the positive score was still elusive even though it looked like I had a ton of space left once she was stymied.

So by some counts I'm the winner (total points) and by some counts she is (# of games), but while we let the Supreme Court sort that out, I just wonder how often people actually wind up placing all their pieces?

Are we that dumb? And if so, should I just be content to have fallen in amongst similarly afflicted folks?

Both gals, incidentally, like the game and their respective boyfriend and husband.

Oh, and the hikes in the Grampians (early morning and early evening) and in the hills behind Edong's Emart were all grand.

Thread: Re: A Wonderful Abstract Strategy Game

Sidewynnder — 2008-01-17T03:18:27+00:00

After re-reading that section and reading your comment Russ, I agree that the section was misleading in regards to Cathedral. I edited that part and changed the wording up. Thanks!

Thread: Re: Travel Blokus after 10 plays

russ — 2008-01-16T06:22:30+00:00

cferejohn wrote:
the self-indulgent assumption that people are going to want to read yet another review of a game that everyone already knows about

And yet here I am wasting my time reading it.

How do you pronounce Blokus anyway?
Now, if I weren't incredibly lazy the designer or manufacturer has probably clarified this, but hey, what do I look like, some kind of guy who isn't incredibly lazy?
There's a thread somewhere that quotes an email from the company about it. But I'm incredibly lazy too. When I lived in the US I said "block-us" (with "us" as in "push"), now I say "blow-koos" (with "oo" as in "food") since that's how the vowels are pronounced in most languages, which have fairly rational consistent spelling unlike English (e.g. Spanish, Polish, Esperanto). But according to the thread, French is more like "block-u" or something.

What were your first thoughts on opening the game?
Well, I can tell you my wife's first thoughts were something like "Purple and orange?
That's what my GF thought too. I on the other hand like the colors.

What's the strategy? Or do I mean tactics?
You know, that distinction is a bit fuzzy to me, but I guess most would consider this game primarily tactical. Its a game of area control where you are trying to leave yourself open spaces to play into while denying the same to your opponent. Generally this is accomplished by playing your pieces up against theirs such that they have fewer corners to play off of.
Definitely it has a lot of tactics, but it is also strategic I would say. Each turn you must decide where the biggest move on the board is. Don't just tactically react to the local situation, playing follow the leader with your opponent. Often the best response is to ignore their move and play elsewhere. There is usually a strategic balance between trying to reduce their options (mainly by trying to block them out of an area) and maximize your own options (mainly by trying to spread yourself as widely as possible).

What's cool about this game?
Its a perfect information luckless abstract strategy game that is very unintimidating.

Yep, it's incredibly easy to explain to newbies and quick to play and visually appealing. Probably a good gateway game.

What's not cool about this game?
Other than the colors of the pieces? Well, 10 plays isn't nearly enough for my pea-brain to have reached this point, but like any perfect information luckless abstract strategy game, it can most likely be "solved," allowing the first player to at least always force a draw.

Technical quibbles:

Combinatorial games are indeed "solvable" in theory (in the sense that mathematically optimal play exists), but in practice the solution is computationally intractable for many "good interesting" games. Look at Go, for instance.

Games with chance are also "solvable" in a mathematical sense (that optimal strategies exist to maximize your expected winnings, or to maximize your probability of winning), but that doesn't stop them from being played and enjoyed by sub-perfect humans either.

Also "solved" does not imply first player advantage. It simply implies that ONE of the players has a guaranteed win (for true classic combinatorial games where no draws are possible), or that there is a possibility (for generalized combinatorial games) that a draw/tie can be forced. There exist plenty of games where the second player can win with optimal play. (Simple example: Nim with 2 equal stacks.)

Thread: Travel Blokus after 10 plays

cferejohn — 2008-01-16T01:42:55+00:00

In my continuing series of "games I've played 10 times", written with the self-indulgent assumption that people are going to want to read yet another review of a game that everyone already knows about, here is my after 10 play review of Travel Blokus. I enjoyed Tom Vassel's recent "question and answer" style review of Brass, so:

How do you pronounce Blokus anyway?
Good question. I've always said "blow-kus" because usually when you've got vowel-consonant-vowel like that in English you use the long vowel sound. Others have said, quite rightly, that the game involves blocks and therefore is probably meant to be pronounced "block-us." Now, if I weren't incredibly lazy the designer or manufacturer has probably clarified this, but hey, what do I look like, some kind of guy who isn't incredibly lazy?

How did you end up getting this game?
Well my wife and I played regular Blokus over at a friend's house. We enjoyed it, and my wife particularly thought it was cool. I'm always looking for games she's actually willing to play, so I picked up the 2 player version.

What were your first thoughts on opening the game?
Well, I can tell you my wife's first thoughts were something like "Purple and orange? Why on earth would they make the tiles purple and orange?"

And? Why would they?
Beats the heck out of me. Kind of a kick in the shorts for those "I'm always blue" people. It does mean that the blocks don't conflict with the block colors of original Blokus, so I guess you could play "Blokus Overlord" or something like that with 6 players...

So, how about the rules?
In brief: you're taking turns laying down 2-dimensional blocks that are made up of 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 square tiles, much like Tetris pieces. When you lay down a block, it must touch one of your existing blocks, but only by the corner (or multiple corners). You continue doing this until neither player can place any more. Whoever has the fewest total tiles left is the winner.

What's the strategy? Or do I mean tactics?
You know, that distinction is a bit fuzzy to me, but I guess most would consider this game primarily tactical. Its a game of area control where you are trying to leave yourself open spaces to play into while denying the same to your opponent. Generally this is accomplished by playing your pieces up against theirs such that they have fewer corners to play off of.

How long does it take to play?
10-15 minutes.

What's cool about this game?
Its a perfect information luckless abstract strategy game that is very unintimidating. The shiny, candy-like pieces, the extremely simple rules, and the fact that it kind of looks like tetris is usually enough to compel anyone who has the slightest inclination towards gaming to play. Compare this to other perfect information luckless abstract strategy games like Go, Chess, and the GIPF series, which are often quite intimidating to new players.

Also, it travels well, as you can deduce from the name.

What's not cool about this game?
Other than the colors of the pieces? Well, 10 plays isn't nearly enough for my pea-brain to have reached this point, but like any perfect information luckless abstract strategy game, it can most likely be "solved," allowing the first player to at least always force a draw. However, the same is true of chess, but the permutations are so vast that only the very top level players are in any danger of this becoming a real issue.

How many permutations does Blokus have as compared to chess?
Geez. I don't know. Don't you have a statistician on speed dial?

To whom would you recommend this game?
Anyone who enjoys abstracts, certainly. Also for people who are trying to get their husband/wife/child/neighbor/dog to play games with them but find they are intimidated by all the bits and dice. I guess that makes it a gateway game, but probably more of a gateway to things like Go or Ingenious than things like Carcassone or Puerto Rico.

To whom would you not recommend this game?
If the excitement of drawing cards or rolling dice is a big part of why you game, probably not the game for you. If you need a theme in your game so it feels like there is a "point", probably not the game for you. However, given its very short play time even people who might not generally care for abstract strategy games would probably enjoy an occasional game on a lark.

If you hate LSU, you may need to repaint the tiles.

See you in 90 plays.

Thread: Re: A Wonderful Abstract Strategy Game

Dementomstie — 2008-01-14T00:33:16+00:00

I disagree about it's travel size, I have taken it with me on trips and we've played it on small tables in coffee shops and resturants. Maybe it isn't small enough to play in a car, and maybe the box IS a bit big for a "travel" game, but if it was any smaller it would be impossible to play. I can't fit it in my pocke the same way I can fit my copy of travel Othello or Pocket Mastermind, but it fits easily in a back pack or suitcase without taking up too much room for clothes and things. Yeah it's kind of big, but it's still travel size, especially compared to the none travel size version.

Thread: Re: A Wonderful Abstract Strategy Game

swandive78 — 2008-01-13T12:46:33+00:00

I agree. Perhaps a better 2-player version than the original because of the smaller field of play (immediate tension). My only real complaint: there's NOTHING about this version that makes it a TRAVEL game!

Thread: Re: A Wonderful Abstract Strategy Game

russ — 2008-01-13T06:21:48+00:00

Although I agree that Blokus has a similar goal to Cathedral (place as many of your pieces as you can), this part is confusing and misleading (about Cathedral):

Sidewynnder wrote:
Blokus is played much like the game Cathedral, but with a slight twist. Instead of playing the pieces adjacent to each other, you must place them diagonal from each other.

All your Blokus pieces indeed must be connected by corners and not touching by sides, but there are no requirements about Cathedral pieces having to touch in any way. Cathedral is quite different from Blokus in that you can place wherever you like on the board (except in a claimed territory of your opponent) regardless of whether or how you're touching your other pieces.

I suppose you're talking about how territory is formed in Cathedral (a chain of pieces must be connected by sides to surround a territory), but it's at best confusing to suggest that Cathedral pieces must somehow be played "adjacent to each other".

Overall the game is very aggressive as you are playing on a small board. This makes for an intense and very fun game every play in my opinion. Every game is a match of tug-of-war with each player playing around the opponents corners to try and manipulate his or her plays. This just makes for an exciting game. Overall, if you are a fan of abstracts and need a good game I would highly suggest Travel Blokus to you. And if you are a fan of Cathedral, this is a must buy.

Travel Blokus is great indeed. The smaller board and the closer starting points make the interaction begin much quicker than the standard Blokus board.

Thread: A Wonderful Abstract Strategy Game

Sidewynnder — 2008-01-13T04:27:19+00:00

While looking for a new game to get that I could enjoy with someone other than my usual game group buddies I stumbled across Blokus on the geek. Now I wasn't sure about a four player version so while I continued to look for a good two player game I found Travel Blokus.

Now, seeing Blokus' great review scores I decided that I would go ahead and pick up Travel Blokus and it helped that it didn't break the bank ringing in at 14 bucks online. When it arrived at my house I was quite surprised at the size of the box. It was indeed travel sized. Upon opening the box up you have a nice little plastic board with raised squares to keep the pieces from moving around during play. The pieces come in two beautiful, translucent colors, orange and purple. They really are wonderful to look at! Also included in the box are two trays to keep the pieces in and a one page rule sheet.

Blokus is very similar to the game Cathedral, but with a few differences. Instead of playing the pieces adjacent to each other to capture territory like in Cathedral, in Blokus you must place the pieces diagonal from each other to block your opponents plays while leaving yourself some openings. This may seem like a very simple caveat but man does it change the game! The object of the game is to fit all of your pieces on the board while blocking your opponent from fitting all of his or her pieces on the board, much like Cathedral. The game ends when neither player can fit any more pieces on the board. Scoring is determined by how many pieces are left over after the game ends. If you have no pieces left and your last piece played was the one square piece, you get bonus points.

Overall the game is very aggressive as you are playing on a small board. This makes for an intense and very fun game every play in my opinion. Every game is a match of tug-of-war with each player playing around the opponents corners to try and manipulate his or her plays. This just makes for an exciting game. Overall, if you are a fan of abstracts and need a good game I would highly suggest Travel Blokus to you. And if you are a fan of Cathedral, this is a must buy.

8.5 out of 10

Thread: Re: Leading off the session

cgund — 2008-01-04T07:45:58+00:00

Do you think there's any advantage to the one who goes first? Sounds like maybe two evenly-matched players would possibly result in a first-turn advantage. You think?

Image

xedric — 2007-12-23T22:06:33+00:00

Tribute To Tetris

Image

xedric — 2007-12-23T22:02:38+00:00

Blokus Duo Up Close

Thread: Re: Same Rules???

manolovila — 2007-11-11T11:22:31+00:00

THANK YOU VERY MUCH TO ALL OF YOU!

Manolo

Thread: Re: Same Rules???

tommynomad — 2007-11-08T21:09:31+00:00

But how "travelable" is the original game? Shenomad and I buy our travel games specifically for their portability. We love the idea of being able to play Blokus with more than just the two of us, but if it's going to be too big to take on a plane....

Thread: Re: Don't Play in Bed if Concerned About Banishment to the C

russ — 2007-10-13T08:52:36+00:00

Now that I have my own copy (thanks to an Act of Random Kindness) I can quote the Travel Blokus rules: "Players count the number of unit squares in their remaining pieces. (1 unit square = -1 point)." An example is given of a player who "could not place 2 three-square pieces and 1 four-square piece. Score: -10 points." The units placed on the board don't explicitly figure into the scores.

Thread: Taking a break from triangles

Gnomekin — 2007-10-04T17:23:40+00:00

Over the last few months, I have been moving away from Blokus and Travel Blokus and playing mostly Blokus Trigon. Blokus Trigon’s ability to play three as well as four so well has simply made it the best Blokus to take to groups. However, when both Nate and Greg canceled, I knew it was time to pull Travel Blokus out again.

To tell you the truth, I was actually a little worried that playing with Blokus with squares instead of triangles might seem simple and boring after all of the clever little tricks we had been developing with triangles.

I shouldn’t have worried.

Blokus Trigon has slightly more flexible placement rules. You don’t necessarily have to touch corners, just not touch edges. With squares, that’s one and the same but that’s not the case with triangles. You can tough an edge to a side. When you’re dealing with triangles, you can figure out ways to worm your way through blockades.

With squares, though, you are confined to the corners and that makes a big difference. You can get blocked hard. Much to Abe’s and my surprise, we found Travel Blokus to be a much more aggressive game than we remembered, with the board quickly becoming tight and compressed. Maye Blokus Trigon had forced us to hone our blocking.

We played three games in rapid succession and Abe won all three. 17-20, 20-21, and 14-20, the last game being one where he managed to block me from one whole side.

I am glad to say that, even after Blokus Trigon, Travel Blokus still has what it takes to be a great game.

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7ofAnn — 2007-09-25T18:58:42+00:00

Playing Blokus with my 4 year-old daughter

Thread: Re: Same Rules???

Verkisto — 2007-09-19T15:39:22+00:00

unixrevolution wrote:
Yup. The start squares have circles on them, and the board is physically smaller, otherwise the rules are identical, right down to the distribution and type of playing bits.

The similarities are so great that I traded off my copy of Travel Blokus and marked my standard Blokus board to play the 2-player version. I think there are pictures in the gallery of other boards that have been modified this way.

Thread: Re: Same Rules???

unixrevolution — 2007-09-19T04:23:55+00:00

caradoc wrote:
The only difference is the starting place. In Blokus you start off in a corner, in Travel Blokus you start off on a central square (The starting squares have little upraised circles on them so they are easy to see).

Cheers.

Giles.

Yup. The start squares have circles on them, and the board is physically smaller, otherwise the rules are identical, right down to the distribution and type of playing bits.

Thread: Re: Same Rules???

caradoc — 2007-09-19T00:08:39+00:00

The only difference is the starting place. In Blokus you start off in a corner, in Travel Blokus you start off on a central square (The starting squares have little upraised circles on them so they are easy to see).

Cheers.

Giles.

Thread: Re: Same Rules???

kittyangel — 2007-09-19T00:02:02+00:00

yup, same I think.

Thread: Same Rules???

manolovila — 2007-09-18T19:26:21+00:00

Are the rules the same for Blokus Travel (Duo) and Blokus original?

Thanks in advance,

manolo

Thread: Leading off the session

daw65 — 2007-08-17T21:24:16+00:00

Games were already happening when I arrived. Jim and Alice were about half way through a game of Travel Blokus. And yet, though there was still half the game yet to play, it already looked grim for Alice. Many of her pieces had been sealed off by Jim, covering her pieces' corners, and after just a couple more plays, Alice found herself completely unable to get to one side of the board. As a result, she was left trying to fit the pieces she had left into a very small space, while Jim had half the board all to himself, to try to squeeze in as many pieces as he could. As Alice explained it, she made a mistake in her second move of the game, and that gave Jim the advantage, enabling him to always be one step ahead of her as she tried to escape the trap. Alice finally was unable to play further, left with 42 squares of unplayable pieces, while Jim continued trying pieces here, and there, making it as compact as possible. Even so, he too was unable to play all his pieces, leaving him with 16 squares of pieces. This, of course, still earned him the win.

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artavash — 2007-08-16T23:02:19+00:00

Our first go at Travel Blokus with my son - practise before our Eurostar trip!

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Gamegrunt — 2007-08-02T14:43:35+00:00

Travel Blokus on vacation: Drury Inn, San Antonio, Texas

Thread: Re: Best of 3 vs Wife (AKA The Ruiner)

Dementomstie — 2007-07-24T01:09:22+00:00

I had the same experience with my friend Joe. Except he beat me by a difference of 60 points.

Thread: Two opponents: Two stratagies

Dementomstie — 2007-07-24T01:06:36+00:00

I won't repost the rules here, and I won't really go into too much detail about the game sessions themselves since I played this probably 10 times this past weekend, I just wanted to post to say that I think if there is any flaw in this game it is my friend Joe.
I was visiting some friends in Santa Rosa this past weekend and my friend Lark and I played many games of Travel Blokus while we had burritos Friday afternoon. Our strategies were pretty similar: Put down a bunch of pieces and eventually try and block your opponent when they start infringing on "your" playing space. I always lost. Lark beat me everytime, not that it really mattered of course, it's an abstract two player strategy game, someone is bound to lose. And, while I always lost, I was usually pretty close to her score. Well, except for the time I had -22 and she had -11. Or anyother game really. I am apparently not very good at Travel Blokus, but it's still lots of fun, so I still enjoy playing.
Then Came Joe.
Saturday morning found me playing Blokus with Joe. I explain the rules and we start playing. I win the first game. Then Joe starts using his evil strategy: He completely blocks me from playing within 6 turns. This happened at least 3 times. I start off and try to place some pieces and he starts putting a blokade(sorry, couldn't resist) around my pieces so that all the corners are blocked. I would seriously get out only 6 or 7 pieces at the most. He beat me one game -8 to -68. Maybe it was only -58. At any rate it was WAY TOO MANY.
Even when Joe played against Lark he destroyed her. We have put a temporary ban on Joe playing Blokus. I am considering getting big Blokus just so there will be two people to plot against Joe and then maybe we'll be able to stop his ingenious plotting.

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Gamegrunt — 2007-07-22T03:31:53+00:00

Theresa and Lacey in a Blokus endgame.

Thread: Re: 69 Cents! First play +mini review

Gamegrunt — 2007-06-12T05:24:59+00:00

I was one of the Blessed Few to find this one cheap as well... 99 cents for a "Duo" version of Blokus at a thrift store.

After owning the original game and this one for awhile I would sooner give up the 2-4 player version than this nifty smaller edition, reason being it gets so much more play than the larger game.

Gg

Thread: Re: 69 Cents! First play +mini review

jaredhayter — 2007-06-11T22:27:56+00:00

I think it's called Blokus Duo in Europe.

69 cents is a sweet deal indeed. I thought I did well buying it for twelve bucks on ebay. I need to find me one of those thrift stores.

Thread: Re: Travel Blokus -- a review

Gamegrunt — 2007-05-29T22:14:43+00:00

edosan wrote:
Travel Blokus is a two-player variant using a smaller board (but the same size pieces, fortunately).

Were there more than one "travel" edition of Blokus? The pieces are hardly the same size in my two copies since by my measure the travel pieces have squares measuring 12mm on a side while the original version has 14mm squares.

Gg

Thread: Travel Blokus - a quickie review for a quickie game

moly19 — 2007-05-23T21:53:09+00:00

We love Blokus. Love, love, love it. All too often, though, there are only two of us who want to play and I don't like to "rope off" an area to enable Blokus Duo. Enter Travel Blokus.

First off, a comment about the "Travel" bit. It is a great deal smaller than regular Blokus, which is important since that is not a game box you want to be lugging around. When I heard that Travel Blokus was available I immediately thought we'd see the same sort of packaging as with Travel Scrabble, with the nifty zippered case and all that good stuff. Not so - instead we have a stoutly built cardboard box. So I was a little disappointed but not that much, as the box is fairly compact and for $14 I suppose we cannot expect such a deluxe package.

Gameplay is pretty much the same as with Blokus - players alternate placing their pieces of various shapes and sizes onto the board in an effort to unload as many of your pieces as possible whilst also trying to limit your opponent's opportunities to do the same. The game pieces are made up of little squares with the smallest piece comprising one square and the largest being made up of five squares, all in a variety of configurations. The board, roughly half the area of that in Blokus, features a complimentary grid of squares with a raised grid to prevent the pieces from sliding around. Size and the number of players apart (Blokus accomodates up to four players) the only key difference is that Travel Blokus has players position their first piece quite near the center of the playing area - in the original recipe Blokus one starts in their "friendly" corner. This change gets the players right into their opponent's space that much quicker, and it's interesting to see whether a player will attack and begin trying to pen in their opponent right away, or if they will play more to the edges and avoid contact in the early going. I like to play it aggressively, heading straight in and trying to tie up my opponent, leaving some space in my "backfield" to throw down some pieces later in the game. Whether this works or not depends on my opponent! A different sort of challenge is presented with Travel Blokus - one does not have three other opponents' moves and strategies to contend with, but I find that you have to play a more active, attacking, style given the smaller playing surface

All in all I'm quite pleased with Travel Blokus. It's a good value for the money and is somewhat more portable than its big brother.

Thread: Re: Travel Blokus -- a review

edosan — 2007-05-23T04:30:24+00:00

swandive78 wrote:
This is a great game, but there is nothing "travel" about it. They missed the boat on that, but it's still worth getting and playing.

Well, I guess it's more "travel" than the original one, but I agree.

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Jormi_Boced — 2007-02-05T03:37:42+00:00

Clever Blocking

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fehrmeister — 2007-01-24T06:29:21+00:00

An Aggressive Game of Blokus in Bed - The Perfecting Launching Pad to Sleeping on the Couch

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pyr-shep — 2007-01-21T12:11:59+00:00

Scandinavian version from dan-spil