A-Z Of Board Games | Page 2 | Vital Football

A-Z Of Board Games

For U could have had "Ur" - oldest board game that there are known written rules for. It's a bit like backgammon . Earliest known rules are written on an old Babylonian clay tablet, now in British Museum in London. Just been playing it online - like it!
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V Viking Chess - Also known as Hnefatafl, 'Tafl, King's Table. It is older than chess, and may have been developed from even earlier ancient Greek or Roman board games. It is an "attack versus defence" game, where playing pieces move like rooks/castles in chess. Chess may have overtaken it in popularity because of the bigger variety of possible moves of the playing pieces. Never played Viking Chess though.
 
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Thought you might have gone for Wembley, the FA Cup board game, there....
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X X-files - board game based on the well-known tv show. Seen it on sale, but never played it.
 
I didn't know there was one, Mike!

Y Yahtzee - though technically more paper than a board. Play this a lot
 
Had Yahtzee game when I was young. Easy to make your own version of it - just need paper, pen and five dice. Also easy to play it now on the internet. I originally assumed that it must be an ancient Chinese dice game, but it iseems to be a relatively recent invention. Quite like it.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Z ZigZag - several games with this title. Some are strategy games, one is a card game obstacle race over differing terrains, where items are collected on the route.. Never played any of them though.
 
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Additional information on Ur/Royal game of Ur - I had already heard of it, but hadn't checked the details before reading this thread. Fairly straightforward layout and rules (in its simplest form) , but fast moving and a quite a lot of tactics to it. Amazing to know that people have been playing it at home and in inns/cafes/bars for over 4000 years! Doesn't take long to play a game either (about 40 mins "live"), so it would fit in well with modern pub games like cribbage and dominoes. Like Yatzhee, you can play it online, no downloads needed.

The hand crafted wooden Ur box sets that are available are not cheap, but it would be easy to make your own version of the game. Its only got 20 squares on the board and although the traditional Ur dice are tetrahedral, you could use normal 1-6 dice, count 5 as zero and 6 as "void, roll again". ( I know it's not the same statistical distribution !). Suitable for all age groups, and likely that children would enjoy making their own version of the board and colouring it in.

The game possibly represents a horse race/chariot race through a town, although the playing pieces are normally just simple draughts-like (or chess pawn) counters. Never been to the Ur area, but some towns in Italy still have this horse racing tradition on festival day - for example, the one in Asti has seven riders in each team too, like the game. There is something similar in Fermo, which I have been too (nice place), but I wasn't there in festival week so missed seeing the racing.
However, that is just a guess and the game could have been to do with travelling a sort of "pathway to heaven" , like Senet. Although over such a long time period, the meaning of the game and its symbols, etc, are thought to have changed even for Senet. The Ur game definitely has the feel of a racing game though.
 
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Interesting about the Royal game of Ur Mike! (Might get the other half on this!) Yes, we made our own version of Yahtzee to take on holiday. I play on line at home. Never played zigzag either.

Well, that brought some interesting responses! And another one finished

Thanks for joining in everyone!
 
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