On this page:
1.14.1 Game Rules
1.14.2 Controls
1.14.3 Auto-Play

1.14  Gobblet Strategy Game

To play Gobblet, run the PLT Games program. (Under Unix, it’s called plt-games).

Gobblet! is a board game from Blue Orange Games:

http://www.blueorangegames.com/

Our 3x3 version actually corresponds to Gobblet! Jr., while the 4x4 version matches Gobblet!.

The Blue Orange web site provides rules for Gobblet! Jr. and Gobblet!. The rules below are in our own words; see also the Blue Orange version.

1.14.1 Game Rules

The 3x3 game is a generalization of tic-tac-toe:

The 4x4 game has a few changes:

1.14.2 Controls

Click and drag pieces in the obvious way to take a turn. The shadow under a piece shows where it will land when you drop it.

Use the arrow keys on your keyboard to rotate the board. Use the - and = keys to zoom in and out. Use _ and + to make the game smaller and larger. (Changing the size adjusts perspective in a slightly different way than zooming.) Depending on how keyboard focus works on your machine, you may have to click the board area to make these controls work.

The button labeled < at the bottom of the window rewinds the game by one turn. The button labeled > re-plays one turn in a rewound game. An alternate move can be made at any point in a rewound game, replacing the old game from that point on.

1.14.3 Auto-Play

Turn on a computer player at any time by checking the Auto-Play Red or Auto-Play Yellow checkbox. If you rewind the game, you can choose an alternate move for yourself or for the auto-player to find out what would have happened. The auto-player is not always deterministic, so replying the same move might lead to a different result. You can disable an auto-player at any point by unchecking the corresponding Auto-Play"checkbox.

Important: In the 3x3 game, you cannot win as yellow against the smart auto-player (if the auto-player is allowed to play red from the start of the game). In other words, red has a forced win in the 3x3 game, and the smart auto-player knows the path to victory. You might have a chance to beat the red player in the default mode, though, which is represented by the Ok choice (instead of Smart) in the Auto-Play Options dialog.

Configure the auto-player by clicking the Auto-Play Options button. Currently, there’s no difference between Smart and Ok in the 4x4 game.