Your first game of Reversi

Set up

Reversi is played on an 8×8 board with 64 discs that are Dark on one side and Light on the other. The game starts with four discs in the middle: two Dark and two Light, set diagonally. Dark moves first, and you play Dark unless you choose Light.

Your first turn

Place a disc on an empty square so that it traps one or more of your opponent’s discs in a straight line, up, down, sideways or diagonally, between your new disc and another disc of your color. Every trapped disc flips to your color. You can flip in several directions with one disc. A move that flips nothing isn’t allowed, so you choose from the squares that do.

If you have no legal move, you pass and your opponent plays again.

How a game ends

The game ends when neither side has a legal move, usually because the board is full. The player with the most discs wins. In our game any empty squares are counted for the winner, and equal counts are a draw.

A short example

At the start, Dark has discs on d5 and e4, and Light has d4 and e5. Dark plays d3, directly above the Light disc on d4. That disc is now trapped between the new disc on d3 and Dark’s disc on d5, so it flips to Dark. Now Dark has four discs, Light has one, and Light chooses a reply.