The final phase might be considered the “mopping up”. This tends to start at turn 14. The expansion of the tiles has created spaces where only one or two players can legally place their shapes. If there is competition it is often wise to grab these opportunities. This part of Blokus is all about putting remaining tiles into the spaces available. Players need to consider how to use their last few shapes to crawl through gaps. Playing the final piece as a single square will give a great sense of satisfaction and a degree of smugness. Glenn, Joshua; Larsen, Elizabeth Foy (14 October 2014). UNBORED Games: Serious Fun for Everyone. Bloomsbury Publishing. p.28. ISBN 978-1-63286-046-0 . Retrieved 15 April 2015.

Some players choose to build structures similar to the Barasona opening to force others to drop their 1 piece. However, this is probably going to cost them in the long run as they will not be able to reach new areas of the board and will miss valuable opportunities to expand. 8. Look at gameplay with a “corners out” mindset Blokus Junior is targeted at younger children. Like Blokus Duo, it is played by two players on a 14×14 board, but it uses only a subset of the pieces that have simpler shapes. There are 12 unique pieces. Each player gets two of each kind, 24 in total. The game also comes with a set of single-player puzzle sheets, each containing a preset piece position on the board and a set of pieces to place into the board following standard Blokus rules. Once the game ends, each player counts every square on the piece(s) that they did NOT place on the board, each counting as a negative (−1) point (e.g. an unplayed tetromino is worth −4 points). A player who played all of their pieces is awarded a 15-point bonus. If the last piece played was a monomino, provided that all pieces of own color have been played, the player is awarded a 20-point bonus instead. The player with the highest score wins. [4] Two- and three-player variations [ edit ] Be aware anytime you create a leak that can be exploited by your opponents and try to limit their options by keeping them small. Let’s see some examples:The Barasona opening starts with the F, X, and W pieces, followed by either the N or Y pieces. You can see it in the image below.

Each player counts the number of unit squares in his/her remaining pieces (1 unit square = -1 point). For these reasons Blokus is a good, solid, family challenge that brings colour and strategy without needing too much deep thought in its playing.They must be adjacent to other pieces of your color, but can only touch the corners of said pieces. Blokus Giant is a larger version, with the game board being about 570mm (22in) square. It was later released by Mattel as Blokus XL. Place tiles toward the center of the board so you have more options. At the start of the game, try to place tiles that reach toward the center of the board. If you have control of the center of the board, then you have more opportunities and space to play the rest of your tiles. Use your long 5-square tiles to get to the middle of the board and spread your pieces. [4] X Research source There have been video games based on Blokus. Irem was the first to develop such a kind of video game, in the form of what is known as Blokus Club with Bumpy Trot. Released in Japan in 2005 for the PlayStation 2, and one year later for the PlayStation Portable, the game features characters from Steambot Chronicles ( Bumpy Trot in Japan) playing the Classic, Travel, and Duo versions of the game. The game received an international release in 2008, under the name Blokus Portable: Steambot Championship.

Gather all the pieces of a single color. Choose 1 of the 4 colors to use throughout the game and take all 21 colored tiles of that color. The tiles are between 1-5 squares large and vary in shape. Organize the tiles in front of you from smallest to largest so you can easily see what shapes you have to use.Blokus Trigon uses pieces made up of triangles rather than squares ( polyiamonds), and is played on a hexagonal board. This particular variant is optimized for three players, but can be played with 2 to 4 players. The same rules apply, meaning that pieces of the same color are still not allowed to touch each other's edges; however, as it is isometric, a corner touching an edge is allowed. It is not easy to determine how bad a leak might be for you, but here are some basics you could take into account: One of the best tips I can give to you is to take advantage of the whole board. You don’t get any points for using space efficiently. Blokus ( / ˈ b l ɒ k ə s/ BLOK-əs) [1] is an abstract strategy board game for two to four players, where players try to score points by occupying most of the board with pieces of their colour. The board is a square regular grid and the pieces are polyominoes. It was designed by French mathematician Bernard Tavitian [2] and first released in 2000 by Sekkoïa, a French company. It has won several awards, including the Mensa Select award and the 2004 Teacher's Choice Award. In 2009, the game was sold to Mattel.

There is a solitaire variation where one player tries to get rid of all the pieces in a single sitting. Try to run straight for the center, and then extend tendrils toward any zones that are looking particularly contested. You can achieve this by starting with a VWZ opening (explained earlier), and then inserting the X, which may be harder to place later on. Blokus is a colourful, abstract game for two to four players. It is a family game, one that's very suitable for children of school age, seven years or older. Players place geometrically shaped tiles on a board, filling in the gaps and aiming to be the first to play all of their tiles. Gameplay What’s a “1” piece? you may ask. When discussing Blokus’s strategy, it is standard to set the name of each piece in advance to avoid confusion later on. The following is the standard naming system for Blokus pieces.If you have managed to follow the strategies so far, you should now have reached many areas on the board. Now it’s the time to spread out your pieces to keep your opponents from playing their pieces, especially the larger ones. Always remember to keep focusing on spreading, it is the more natural way to maintain your options open. In the standard/original four-player version, each player's first piece must touch one of the board's four corners, as shown. Continue taking turns until you can’t play any more tiles. Go around the board and place 1 tile at a time during your turn. Make sure all of your pieces are connected to a corner of at least one other piece or else the piece doesn’t count. When a player places their last tile or when players can’t make any more moves, the game ends.