Beyond Tic Tac Toe: Challenging and Exciting New Games to Be Played with Colored Pens or Pencils

This book is a collection of short descriptions of seven games that can be played by marking segments with different colored markers and a large set of sheets used to play the games. Six of the games are for two, three or four players and one is for two players only. In each case, the first player is chosen in a manner agreeable to all and marks one segment. After that, the players alternate in marking segments with their designated color and scores accumulate based on figures that are created or the existence or absence of adjacent colors. For example, in the Mondrian game, a player scores points if they colored in a section that can be used to form a rectangle when combined with one or more sections that were previously colored. Some of the other games require that the board be completely filled before the scoring is done. All of the games involve strategy and the simple-minded player is easily defeated. The name of the creator and the year of creation of each of the games are included. The youngest two are nearly one hundred years old and the oldest over one hundred and twenty five years old. These games are easy to understand and play, although some of the strategies can be quite involved. Therefore, it is incorrect to consider them similar to tic-tac-toe, which is a game that involves almost no strategy. They are all very interesting and can be difficult if you are playing against someone with a sound strategy for play.