Since the dawn of civilization, mankind has been fascinated by strategy. Games requiring skills have been played by warriors throughout history to determine the fate of kingdoms, each player taking part in the age-old traditions of their culture. One of the oldest strategy game in existence is the game called GO. It came to existence over 3000 years ago in China where it was given the name, "Wei-chi". The popularity of GO quickly spread to other countries like Japan and Korea.

Although the popularity spread to other countries, in China it has had its good and bad times. Confucius, a well respected philosopher looked at it nothing else but a waste of time. Not all critics critiqued it as being bad. As a matter of fact, Chairman Mao required his generals to study it and learn from it. The Cultural Revolution viewed it as a pastime of intellectuals.

Buddhist priests had visited China and took the game to Japan around 1,200 to 1,400 years ago. There, the game of GO reached its maximum potential. GO was studied by Japanese warrior class who acquired the passion for it and passed down their techniques to their family members in the same way they did with techniques of sword-making and the code of the samurai. GO's popularity stayed alive as the passion for it spread to all levels of society. Wealthy, poor, old, young, all enjoyed a game of Go. Soon it reached a status equal to that of the tea ceremony in Japan.

A GO set has 180 white stones and 181 black stones. Depending on the kind of set you purchase the thickness of the stones may vary. The thicker the stone is, the better it is. Stone are held between the tips of the index finger and middle finger throughout the game.

A GO set includes bowls that will hold all the black and white stones. The bowls (GO-KE) are usually made of wood and sometimes if you prefer, plastic. The shape is similar to a flattened sphere but with the lid shaped in the form of a saucer. The lid is used to hold the stones that were captured from your opponent throughout the game.

A NOT SO PERFECT ASYMMETRY

The board for Go is not a perfect square. As a matter of fact the standard size is approximately 16-1/2 inches by 17-1/2 inches. This prevents perfect symmetry. At the end, when a game is finished and both opponents have stones that almost cover the rectangle board, these stones butt together and, in this way, they reflect the real nature of the game. The nature of the Go game is . . .two players use their stones to compete and gain territory on the surface of the board. They accomplish this by staking out areas that they want to conquer forcing the opponent to try to push and squeeze those areas left for battles. Coming to the conclusion of the battle of wills, the stones lie strewn about the board, start testament to the meeting of strategies, and tell the stories of battles won and lost.

The Go board begins with nothing on it. The game starts to take shape after 30 to 50 moves. When a game is finished, about 200 to 250 moves have taken place, the layout of black and white form a record in which people could look at it and see the plans and ideas of the two players. Go translates as "hand conversation," and which the truth of the game is really a series of discussions and arguments. . . person's point of view about the choice made for an offensive or defensive move.

The Game starts with Black stone's move…

There are two players for this game. One is the black stone player and the other the white stone player. The black stone player always goes first in placing a stone in the intersections of the board and then they take turns during the game. You cannot move a stone once it's place and it will not move until it's captured.

Go has three basic rules and they are . . .

1. When a stone or several stones are completely surrounded with no empty points (liberties) within the surrounding area, they are captured. Once captured, the dead stones are removed from play. When a group of stones have only one remaining liberty it is considered to be an "Atari", which is similar to "check" in chess.
2. Suicide move is an illegal move in GO Game. When a player places a stone to be simply captured by the opponent, the move is an illegal move and such a move is not allowed.
3. If a move would result in the same board pattern that existed before the opponent's move, the player is required to abstain from that move and make a move elsewhere. This situation is known as a KO (the knot). This rule is used to prevent stalemates and endless repetition.

Score counting process at the end of game….

The game is over when the possibilities for gaining territory or capturing the stones have seas to exist. The winner is the person who has gained the most territory. There are several scoring systems and the Japanese scoring system counts each captured stone and each surrounded intersection as a point.

JAPANESE RULES OF THE GAME (in more details)

Go is more challenging than chess but has only a few simple rules. The rules can be learned in half an hour. This game's complexity is based on the huge number of possibilities for each move that can be done (It is said to be 10 to the 750th power). You learn situations from repeated play and use that for future games.

It is true that today you can find many of English-language books for beginners to study from, but the truth of Go is that you have to play to improve your knowledge and skill. Learning to play Go can be compared to learning to speak a foreign language. You can take a few lessons to get by, but it will take years of study and practice to actually become fluent. This shouldn't scare you away of experiencing a game of Go since you will find it to be a lot of fun and enjoyable for the family.

The Board: The traditional wooden Japanese Go table (go-ban) is approximately 17-1/2 inches long. It is 16-1/2 inches wide and 4 to 5 inches thick. The Go table has four legs. The playing area (15 inche square) is marked out in a grid pattern of 19 parallel lines and 19 lines at right angles to these There are 361 intersections or points. The handicap points are the dots found in the board. They are intersections of the fourth, tenth, and sixteenth lines found in the board of each direction.

The pieces: The pieces are made of two sets of stones. A set of 181 black stones and a set of 180 white stones (361 in all). The stones are about 6/8 inches in diameter and 1/8-1/2 inches thick.

HOW IS THE GAME PLAYED?

Objective: By placing the stones on the board, each player tries to win the game by surrounding unoccupied territory as well as enemy stones. Surround more than your opponent and you win!

Order of Play: Each player takes a turn. The first move is made by the player that has the black stones. Players will also take turns playing black unless there is a handicap. (See handicapping section, below.) When it is your turn, you will place stone on an unoccupied space. There is one exception to this, it is known as the "KO situation". (if you want to know what the KO situation is then look at "basic rules" #3 above or "KO situation" below)

Playing procedure: The board will always start empty except when the player is playing with handicap stones.

The player will choose a point that is formed by the line intersections from the board to place the stone.

Form connected groups or chains so you can surround as many empty points and the opponent's stones as much as possible.

Should all the intersections surrounding one or more stones be taken by stones of the other color, the former stone or group of stones is removed from the board. (only those that are linked directly to a point by a line, and not diagonally.) It is possible to win a game without capturing any stones, because the objective is territorial gain.

Handicapping: Black has an advantage since it always has the first turn. If the players are playing more than one game then they take turns being black. It is allowed for a player to keep the black stone if he had lost 3 games in a row.

If that wasn't enough to balance the players then further handicapping will be used. The weaker player already with the black on his possession may place stones (2 or more) on the board allowing the white to begin the opening move (see table below). The handicapped stones may be increased to balance the game.

KO situations: If a move would result in the same board pattern that existed before the opponent's move, this is a KO. A KO (threat) can be repeated and it will never end. In KO situations the player is required to abstain from that move and make a move elsewhere on the board. If the player just has one KO situation, it may involve many stones. Once the number of KO situations have reached 3, then it is a draw.

Seki situations: A Seki situation happens when opposing groups are placed so that both players must sacrifice their own stones to occupy an uncontrolled point. Seki situations are always left alone until the end of a Go game. The free points in them are not counted when it's time to count for scoring.

Dame points: A dame point is an empty point between territories. When there is a dame point there is no benefit to either player. Dame points are also left alone until the end of the game and then ignored in scoring.

Prohibitions: You cannot make an move that causes repetition of a position that was formed earlier.

A stone cannot remain on the board once it has been captured. You cannot place a stone on a point where it will be surrounded by opponents stones unless this move may cause immediate capture of your opponents stones.

End of play: The game is over when both players have come to the conclusion that there are no further advantages that can be gained by either player.

Scoring: The board in the diagrams has been used to illustrate the basic scoring process

1) All stones left in opponents territory are captured and removed.

2) Any empty points in either neutral or Seki situations have stones placed so it discounts them in the scoring process. The players can use the stones that are not in use to do this.

3) Black places white stones that were captured on empty points in white's territory and vice versa.

4)What is counted is the number of empty points left in the territories of the players.

Result: The one with the largest number of empty points left at the end of the game wins.

CHINESE RULES of the game.

Go has a very simplistic look and feel with a complexity to give it a long life of playability. The roots of the game is a mystery since it is a very ancient invention that it permits almost any origin theory. We do know as a fact that this famous board game came from China around three or four thousand years ago. That's all we know about its origin.

The game is strong in Asia. It's very popular, especially in Japan. There are even tournaments every year that are played by professionals. You hear about them in newspapers all over Asia.

Go is played on a 19 by 19 line board in China. The players use the "Chinese rules" created in China for the game. The Chinese rules are as follows:

Number of players: The number of players is two.

To start: The board will always start empty except when the player is playing with handicap stones.

The play: Place a stone on any empty point (intersections including edges). The stones don't move after that unless they are captured by the opponent.

You are allowed to pass a turn if you wish to. During a practice game, passing is allowed only at the end of the game. The game is over when both players keep passing and a move can't be done by either one.

Single Piece Capturing: There are four open points that are called "liberties" and are found around a stone that remains by itself in the middle of the board. When the liberties are occupied then your stone is captured. This method of capturing includes the edge or corner of the board.

Group Capturing: Be very careful because there is also group capturing. This is to both your advantage and disadvantage. A whole group of stones can be captured if the opponent surrounds the group so the liberties are lost and you remove the captured group stones. Be aware at all times so you can gain(offensively) and won't loose(defensively) any group stones.

Group stones: stones of the same color placed on the board so they touch each other.

These stones are like a family. They are united so they are a unit. Each stone is a member that cannot be captured individually but is captured only when the entire unit(group) is captured.

Self-Capturing: The action of placing your stone on your last liberty is called "self-capture". After this you remove the suicide stones from the board.

Simultaneous Surroundings: If the self-capture move captures any enemy stones at the same time, then it is considered a capture move and not a suicidal one.

No Repeating: Positions on the board cannot look identical to previous positions. This may prevent the placing of a stone on an open space. This prevents endless repetition of capture and re-capture stones also known as "KO" situations.

Scoring: When both players keep passing because a move cannot be completed then the game is over. The number of empty points he has completely surrounded to the number of points the stones are placed on is how you get the score for the game. A point that is completely surrounded is counted as the players territory. You don't count the points that have not been completely surrounded.

Winning: After the score has been added we must consider the fact that black was first so he had the advantage. To compensate for that, 6-1/2 points are added to the final tally of the second player. This is done only if two games were not played with alternate turns of being the black stone. This kind of handicap is called "Komi".

Who Won This Game?: Add all surrounded and occupied points for black. Same thing is done to black. Add 6.5 points "Komi" to white for being second. If black has 44 points and white has 37 points, black wins by 0.5 point because the total for white is only 43.5 (37+6.5).

Go Techniques:

1) SINGLE EYE GROUP

The single liberty on the corner of the board is also called an "eye". It has no chance for survival since the opponent can play on it and capture your group or you can play on it and commit suicide.

2)DIFFERENT SINGLE EYE GROUP

White has two eyes, but they are connected instead of being separate. White is doomed. Why? Black can capture it at any time.

3) DOUBLE EYE GROUP

If there are two eyes remaining for white then black may play on one of the eyes, the white group still has an eye and the black stones are captured.

4) FOR GRABS

The point circled in red is a very crucial situation. If white gets there first it forms a two-eye (one eye on the left side of the new white stone, and another eye on the right side of the new white stone) and it is safe. But, if black gets there before white does, then white is doomed.

5) SAFETY SPOT

White stones on the top and black stones in the middle layer in this illustration are safe. Anyone who occupies the point marked "X," will have a single-eye group. It's a Seki situation. ( Look at "Seki situation") Whoever fills the Seki spot will be killed. Therefore, nobody should fill that spot. In this case, both sides are safe.

THE GAME IN TODAY'S WORLD...

In the modern world, Japan spends millions of dollars for tournaments publishes articles on this game on the daily Go columns of the newspapers.

Players from other countries like Taiwan and Korea have travel to Japan to join the tournaments. Now there is professional competition in these countries. An annual competition called the China-Japan Super Go is held. There are Chinese players that received Government-salary play against Japanese players who play in a very intense professional tournament.

Professionals dedicate themselves to study the game full-time under a master from their childhood. They continue their intense study until they reach their early twenties. Go is an art and the beauty of Go appears when it is played in its highest level.

The popularity of the game really shines when you find out that more than 25 million people play Go. There are about 100,000 players in Europe. There are approximately 20,000 in the U.S. There is also an annual World Amateur Go Championship where more than 30 countries participate. Over 200 players usually attend the U.S. Go Congress every year.

The American Go Association has over 1,000 palying members. There are over 100 Go clubs.

AMERICAN GO ASSOCIATION (AGA)

The address of the American Go Association is the following:

P. O. Box 397, Old Chelsea Station, New York, NY 10113

GO IN THE BRITISH ISLES

1. The British Go Association, has a price list for books and equipment (also available to non-members), club lists, the E-Journal, information about the Journal, and access to programs in the BGA Computer Library of Shareware software for PCs, etc.

2. Irish Go Association Home Page This includes a PostScript version of their Newsletter -- maintained by Stephen Flinter.

3. UK Go players mailing list: send e-mail messages to British Go players, at ukgo@eng.ox.ac.uk.

4. There are ways of contacting Some British Go Clubs and Players, including the Oxford City Go Club.

5. Private sales and exchanges of Go-related material via the UK Go Exchange and Mart.

COMMENTS/QUOTES made on Go game

"The oldest and best of the native Chinese games, wei-k'i, is older than AD 1000." -In Murray 1952:35-36

"It looks very scholarly and critical. But with few exceptions such condemnations are based on flimsy, insufficient and subjective arguments...." (Bernhard Karlgren - the great sinologue 1951:117)