Invented by a mathematics professor on the west coast, Octi looks and plays like nothing you've ever seen. A warfare game through and through, yet far simpler than chess or Axis & Allies, Octi presents two players with unparalleled depth and a variety of options from the opening move to the endgame.
This product exhibits two strengths before anyone makes a move: A dark, foreboding board that's visually reminiscent of a scarred battlefield, as well as the opportunity to select between two game modes of varying complexity. In the simpler version of the game, each player lines up four spaceship-like markers in a pre-determined line, with the goal of eventually moving one of them into any position within the opponent's opening line. These markers move only one space at a time.
The catch is that markers can't move at all until you place arrow-like tongs in at least one of five specially designed slots in their fronts; each slot points in a different direction (due left, due right, straight ahead, or diagonally forward-left and forward-right).
Once and only once you place a tong in a piece's slot that points forward and to the left, for example, it can move diagonally in that direction. Placing a tong counts as a move, but increases the versatility of the piece it's placed in. Finally, pieces can jump over each other a la Chinese checkers, as long the tong for the intended direction is already in place.
Thinking ahead is critical here. A good player can recognize the weaknesses in an opponent's lineup and exploit pieces from a direction where they can be jumped over, but where they also cannot jump an opposing piece themselves. The number of possible permutations of moves quickly becomes infinite the deeper one gets into the game, as does the sense of tension and anticipation. For those not satisfied with what the simple version offers, a broader game with six markers and a larger map is also provided.
Octi is just plain cool, right down to the arrow built into each marker to help remind players to keep them oriented in the same way for the entire game. This reviewer highly encourages you to part with a reasonable $30, to add this board game to your collection as soon as possible.
