Here is the core of the games invented by Christian Freeling. If abstract games matter at all, these eight do matter. |
 | Grand Chess is a natural evolution of Chess towards completeness.
It seeks to add a new chapter to Chess.
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 | Dameo, on the other hand, seeks to replace International Draughts:
"Draughts players, please hide your hidden agendas, open your minds and listen carefully: Draughts is the most drawish of the long-range games due to an intrinsic flaw. It can't be remedied, it won't go away - you're playing the wrong game." |
 | Sygo, unlike Go, has neither cycles nor ambiguous rules. It uses the Symple move protocol and the embedded turn order balancing system, so it requires no komi. Unlike Symple, it features capture and the drama associated with it, and due to the possibility of 'seki' it can end in a draw.
Calling Sygo 'Go on Speed' is a metaphor, but not a bad one.
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| Next to these three, that are so clearly affiliated with the classics, there are four games that open comparable realms of strategy of their own accord, two of them co-discoveries. And then there's Mu, opening incomparable realms of strategy. |
 | Symple's innovative move protocol, also featured in Sygo, poses a dilemma regarding starting a new group or growing every existing group. The embedded balancing system is the most sophisticated to date in the realm of abstract games. Symple is a joint discovery of Christian Freeling and Benedikt Rosenau. |
 | Of all games that can end in a draw, Havannah must have the smallest margin. There's nothing quintessential about the game, just an extremely lucky merger of three related winning structures, the interaction of which makes it feel like it is positioned somewhere between Go and Hex. |
 | Emergo is the quintessential column checkers game, and the closest any game may ever get to being 'poetry in motion'. It is also the only column checkers game that did not emerge as a 'columnification' of an existing game.
Emergo is a joint discovery of Christian Freeling and Ed van Zon. |
 | Bushka is a checkers game based on 'contact capture' and fully exploits the possibilities of this strangely neglected method of capture that only survived in one traditional game called Fanorona. The basic framework is taken from Draughts, but Bushka also doubles as the cradle of Dameo's linear movement. |
 | Mu is Christian Freeling's magnum opus, an epic multi-player territory game with many layers of deepening intricacies. An applet requires more than mindsports applets currently provide, so a halfway step will be the release of a generic two-player version that will give players a first opportunity to play and to prepare for the multi-player version that will be build on the same framework later.
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You can play 4 more games by Christian Freeling here, 4 traditionals, the modern classic Hex, and Mark Steere's Oust.
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 | "Chess is a sport, a violent sport."
Marcel Duchamp
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 | Dragonfly introduces Shogi's treacherous 'paratroopers' within the framework of western Chess. The game is not wanting of complexity, so next to the king and the pawns, it features only the three basic pieces.
Since captured pawns do not return, the game has no 'endgame' like Chess. With all pieces in play at all times, it eventually topples one side or the other. |
 | Where Dragonfly is 'easternized Chess', Yari Shogi is 'westernized Shogi'. It takes some of the most prevalent characteristics of the game, like forward orientation and piece promotion, to extremes and and puts them into a logical framework based on the rook, the bishop, the knight, and the Shogi pawn. |
 | Japanese Chess poses a major challenge to the western game as a sport weapon. Despite its respectable age there's nothing archaic about it. This in sharp contrast with the Chinese branch that failed to evolve and froze into Xiangqi.
"If you find a good move, look for a better one" (Shogi proverb). |
 | A fair century of playing and analyzing have eventually exposed this great game as too blunt a weapon, at least in the international sports arena. Draughts in match play is as dead as the dodo. Like many physical sports, it needs an upgrade in material. This is somewhat hard to swallow for dedicated Draughts players. |
 | Few games ever evolved successfully from one grid to another, and Draughts is probably no exception. Hexdame is a literal translation of Draughts to the hexgrid. The main difference between the games is that Hexdame knows no one-on-one opposition, resulting in similar tactics serving a different strategy. As a weapon it should be less drawish, but it is still far from being a match for Dameo. |
 | Mark Steere's Oust is a quintessential game that opens a realm of its own. It has simple and clear mechanics that serve its theme intuitively, yet result in a game the strategy of which may appear very counterintuitive. A beautiful organism with ways that aren't yet fully understood. |
 | Go is arguably the quintessential territory game. However, even Occam's Razor cannot prevent the ambiguities arising from cycles, "ko" being the most basic one. Go's rules appear simple and concise, but the devil is in the details. Yet Go, as a concept, has an almost universal appeal, and there is a broad concensus about all but the most eccentric positions. |
 | Think about a placement and connection game on a diamond shaped hexgrid, and you'll end up with Hex. The Danish mathematician Piet Hein found that out, as did his American collegue John Forbes Nash. Hex is quintessential, simple and very deep. If one thing can be said against it, it would be that it requires a considerable insight in strategy before tactics can be appreciated. |
| "Christian Freeling has invented a mancala that will make you want to forget all the previous ones you've played."
Wayne Schmittberger, editor of Games Magazine. |
Grand Chess, Dragonfly, Yari Shogi, Dameo, Hexdame, Bushka, Emergo,
Sygo, Mu, Havannah and the Glass Bead Game © MindSports
Symple © MindSports and Benedikt Rosenau
Hex was independently invented by Piet Hein and John Forbes Nash.
Oust © Mark Steere
All applets by Ed van Zon
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