Cost:$8.00 + $1.00 shipping From: Jolly Games, 3236 Peacock Lane, Santa Maria CA, 93455 Players: 2 Playing Time: 15-30 minutes Type of game: Abstract strategy Complexity: 1 Skill level: 5 Reviewed by: Peter Sarrett, Issue 1.4, May/June 1993
Connection games-- in which at least part of the object is to connect opposite sides of the board to each other while preventing your opponent from doing the same-- are a pretty healthy sub-genre of strategy games. Past examples include Twixt, Hex, and the appropriately-titled Connections. Knots, the latest effort from the makers of Wiz-War, is a quick, simple variation on the theme.
Knots provides a 6x6 game board (in four jigsaw-style pieces) and thirty-six square tiles (my copy actually has forty) depicting the lengths of rope. Two lengths of rope enter and exit each edge of a tile, so that eight rope connections are possible with each tile. Some ropes enter and exit from the same edge; some don't exit at all, ending instead in a frayed end; and others splice into two ropes, entering from one location and exiting in two different locations.
Tiles are shuffled and placed in a stack face down. Players start the game with two tiles each and take turns playing a tile and drawing a new one from the deck. Tiles may be played on any vacant space on the board. One player tries to connect the top and bottom board edges with an unbroken length of rope while the other tries to do the same with the left and right edges. The first player to succeed wins the game.
That's it. You can't get much simpler than that. And therein lies its charm. It's simple to learn and takes very little time to play-- yet there's a decent amount of strategy involved in playing well. Like Wiz-War, the board and tiles are simple cardboard pieces-- hence the low price. The box is about as large as two paperback books set side-by-side, compact enough to carry in a backpack or pocketbook. It's well suited for play at lunchtime, or for filling a brief period of idle time.
Knots certainly isn't a blockbuster, and it's not a game you're going to walk away raving about. But it's easy, cheap, fast, and fun-- a nice value.