Play Reversi

How to Play Reversi

Reversi was originally a board game that has become highly popular as a desktop computer game much like the card games solitaire and spider. It is also known by the trade name “Othello”. It is categorized as an abstract strategy board game with two players.

The board is composed of 8 columns and 8 rows and each player has pieces or discs of differing colors (usually black and white).

The aim of the game is to end up with the most pieces of your color on the board by the end of the game. The end is reached when either the board is full or when neither player is able to perform a legal move.

Starting the Game

Although the original game did not have rules for a starting position, modern interpretations, including that of Othello, start with two of each player’s pieces in the 4 central squares. The pieces are positioned in such a way that neither player has their pieces connected vertically or horizontally.

Generally speaking black goes first (where the pieces are black and white).

Gameplay

A legal move consists of a player placing one piece on the board whereby a horizontal, vertical or diagonal straight line is created that has the moving player’s pieces at either end and all pieces in between are of the opposing player.

Assuming the moving player is black all the white pieces in between the two black pieces are “turned black”. This action is repeated for every legal line that has been created by the new piece. Once all legal lines have been turned the move is over.

Players continue to take turns to move until an end is reached. At this point the pieces on the board are counted up and the winner is the person with the most reverse pieces on the board.