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Go: A 4,000 Year Old Chinese Strategy Game

Go is an ancient board game invented in China almost 4,000 years ago, and is played by millions of players all across the world. Go goes by many names. It is called "Baduk" in Korea and "Weiqi" in China. It is a national sport in many Asian countries, where professional players face off against one another in highly competitive tournaments where the winner takes home large cash prizes.

Go is one of the world's most popular board games, with millions of players in Asia of all ages. While Go has been known in the West since the late 1800's, when a German chemist named Oscar Korschelt wrote about the game in the German magazine "The German Society of East Asian Art and Culture" after visiting Japan, the game has stayed under the radar until recently.

Most people have seen glimpses of Go in popular media. The Chinese President, Hu Jintao, presented President Obama with a Go board specially crafted by American woodworker, Frank Salantrie. Go also appears in movies like A Beautiful Mind and in a Domino's Pizza commercial.


Go is a highly complex game. While computer programmers have devised artificial intelligence that can beat top chess players, professional Go players still can best even the most advanced computer program. Go is great to keep the mind sharp and is fun for players of any ability or experience level, and is also a great way to meet new people and be part of a new fad taking hold in the states.

Go is a two player game. All you need to play is a board, and a set of white and black stones. Each player alternates placing a single stone on the board. You are free to play wherever you feel like, so long as you follow the three simple rules of the game. That's right, Go only has three rules! Game play is simple, but the strategy can get quite complex. The interesting part, is how much your own creativity and style can sing on the board.

The object of the game is to build walls and surround the intersections on the board. Each intersection counts as one point, and is called "territory." Whoever has more territory by the end of the game is the winner.

In future installments, we'll get into the actual rules of the game, and a little bit about the American Go scene, and perhaps you'll be inspired to try the game out for yourself!


Article Source: Jonathan Hop

2 comments:

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    ReplyDelete
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