Quarto is a two-player abstract strategy board game invented by the Swiss mathematician Blaise Muller and published by Gigamic beginning in 1991. It is played on a four by four board with sixteen distinct pieces that vary along four attributes: height, color, shape and whether the top is flat or hollow. Rather than each player owning a set of pieces, the players take turns choosing a piece from the shared pool and handing it to their opponent to place on the board, an arrangement that makes Quarto an impartial game rather than a partisan one. A player wins by creating a row, column or diagonal of four pieces that all share at least one attribute, and in an optional variant a two by two square of matching pieces also counts, giving the simple ruleset unusually deep strategic traps for a game of its size.
Facts
Sport
Game Type (category) Classification
Player Count Connections
Sources
1. Quarto (board game) (Wikipedia)
Key Facts, Genre
Abstract strategy game, impartial game
Key Facts, Players
Two players
Key Facts, Year Released
Year Released: 1991
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