Introduction
A game is a form of human interaction where one or more individuals compete to accomplish a specific task under certain conditions or to outperform other participants in that task, within a casual environment with no serious consequences. A game is generally played for entertainment during leisure time, but many individuals who excel in certain games often pursue the art of playing those games as a professional career. Games can be of various types: played by individuals or teams, requiring a toned physique or a sharpened mind, and completed in minutes or taking days to complete. Games that require more organized skill or training are known as sports.
In this blog, we are going to discuss some specific types of games and sports. Those that are played mostly through the mind, memory, and intellect. Most of them are played on a board. We are going to discuss the origins and evolution of seven such “brain games” that got embedded in the history and culture of those civilizations, if not the whole world. This blog won’t discuss the nitty-gritty of the gameplay, but will just discuss the relationships between the basic gameplay and the cultures it influenced, or was influenced by. So, let’s begin.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1: Oware / Mancala
Mancala is one of the earliest known game families in human history. It originated in Sub-Saharan Africa around 3000 BCE, but slowly travelled to the Middle East and Caribbean during the medieval and colonial periods. The original gameplay consisted of a turn-based game which involved sowing of seeds in pits. The objective was to capture the seeds from the opponent’s pit. The seeds had no hierarchy, and thus, the one with more seeds won.
The brain game slowly evolved with additions of multi-row boards, involvement of abstract game strategy, and formation of local variations, which grew into individual games. One such popular game is Oware, which is played mainly in Western African nations like Ghana. Oware is one of the most popular games within the Mancala family, with a fixed set of rules for gameplay and outcome. Mancala, in early African cultures, acted as a reference for resource distribution.
The brain game influenced the culture by establishing virtues like communal balance, resource redistribution over domination, long-term strategy, and presenting a non-zero-sum worldview. Manchala games are still very popular in Africa and are embedded in its culture.
Chapter 2: Backgammon
The earliest history of a brain game related to Backgammon can be found in Mesopotamia from 2600 BCE, in the form of the Royal Game of Ur. Originally, it was a dice-based game, which slowly spread to the Roman Empire, and later to the Islamic and Western worlds, via the Byzantine Empire. Both the Royal Game of Ur and Backgammon are types of racing games that depend on luck and probability for outcome. The objective is to remove all the pieces from the board faster than the opponent, depending on dice rolls.
Backgammon, over time, gave rise to a basic understanding of probability, especially in the Middle Ages. The game shows how those cultures considered fate and luck as important conditions in determining outcomes, which is still present in many modern societies. This game also popularized the “dice” to the world, which in turn influenced different games across different cultures.
Chapter 3: Chess
Chess is perhaps the most popular board game. It is a two-player turn-based game whose objective is to capture or “Checkmate” the opponent’s king. The pieces are hierarchical, and each piece category has its own power and value. The brain game actually developed during the 5th-6th century CE in India, originally called “Chaturanga”. The original pieces were representatives of four types of armies: Infantry, Cavalry, Elephants, and Chariots.
After the Islamic invasions in India, the game passed to Persia, where it got the name “Shatranj.” In Islamic Persia, the pieces became aniconic, as Islam forbids idols. The game soon went to Europe through both the Iberian Peninsula (via Cordoba Sultanate) and the Kyivan Rus (via Byzantine Empire).
In Europe, the Queen and the Bishops’ power increased due to the political and theological influences. The game continued to grow in Mediterranean Europe and the Russian Empire, with various evolutions like world-class tournaments (1850s), time controls (1860s-80s), tactical & positional plays, world chess championship(1886), chess engines (1980s), AI engines (2020s), etc.
The game of chess reflects the warfare abstractions, the hierarchical chain of command, rational planning, intellectual prestige, and strategic thinking models, which were core to different environments through which it evolved: whether it’s India, Persia, Russia, or Western Europe. Today, chess is a professional sport played all over the world, with countries like Russia, India, China, and the USA dominating the top spots.
Chapter 4: Pachisi / Ludo
Pachisi was another Ancient Indian game from the 6th century CE, which slowly evolved into what is now called Ludo. While Chaturanga was mostly popular with the elite or intellectual class in Ancient India, Pachisi was more popular with the common households. The gameplay consisted of a cross-shaped board with around six cowrie shells as dice. The objective was to bring all the pieces off the board as fast as possible with respect to the outcome of the cowrie shells rolled. The gameplay also involved capturing opponent pieces, which resulted in the pieces restarting their journey from home.
With the passage of time, the cross-shaped board became a square-shaped one, the multiple shells became a singular die, and Pachisi evolved into Ludo, with the influence of the West. The brain game clearly depicts the Indian acceptance of fate on outcomes, and also the use of strategy and tactics when encountering unfavourable circumstances. Ludo, today, is a highly popular casual game, played among the families of the Indian subcontinent, and is now going through a high digital emergence with a huge number of apps.
Chapter 5: Go
Go is an East Asian board game that dates back to around 3000 BCE. Although the origin is so old, the actual game was formalized around the early Tang period (7th century CE). The game also spread to Japan and Korea, with a huge influence on the latter’s culture.
The objective of the game is to control a larger portion of the board than the opponent, through black and white stones across the grid. It is a turn-based game where stones can only be placed on a grid if there is at least one adjacent empty grid. If a stone or a group of stones is surrounded by enemy stones from all sides, that group is considered captured and is removed from the board.
The brain game has undergone several changes over the course of time, including tactical evolution, some innovation in set rules, and even the involvement of AI through AlphaGo. The game upholds the Chinese philosophy of positional strategies combined with disciplined rigor. Go also visualizes the art of controlling a territory with brains instead of brawn. Today, the game is very popular in China, Taiwan, and Korea, with strong professional circuits.
Chapter 6: Shogi
Shogi is a Japanese strategy board game that evolved from the Indian Chaturanga in the 10th-11th century CE. The pieces are the same shape and color, with their ownership indicated by the direction they point, i.e., towards the opponent. One major difference from regular chess is that the captured pieces can be used by the opponent as their own piece under certain conditions. This brain game emphasizes recycling pieces.
The game saw tactical evolution during the Edo period with many minor rule changes. The game requires players to be flexible without sacrificing discipline, which symbolizes Japanese flexibility. Presently, the brain game is very popular in Japan and has a professional ranking system.
Chapter 7: Dominoes
Dominoes is a popular game in the West, which finds its origin in medieval China, around the 11th century CE. The gameplay involves matching tiles called dominoes by the number of dots. And arranging them in a chain until one player is out. The number of matching dominoes remaining with the opponent became their score. In this way, the person to score a set number first wins. The game has a huge factor of probability and critical thinking.
The brain game evolved across the last millennium, with respect to scoring systems, until it reached Europe in the 18th century CE. The game gives importance to Chinese logic and pattern matching. Today, the game is very popular as a casual game and is embedded in many Western regional cultures.
Conclusion
Games have influenced humans as much as humans have influenced games. Games, especially these “brain games,” beautifully depict how humans gather information, process it inside their brains, and respond accordingly. Playing such games from a very early age also helps in cognitive evolution, pattern recognition, detecting fallacies and biases, and memory development of a child. These brain games can also help in binding together friends, families, and other relationships, despite daily human struggles. Games and sports help us in many more ways than we actually realize.
That is all for this blog. Hope you found it helpful. If so, please comment, share, and subscribe to my newsletters for updates on my future blogs. Thank you for reading this blog.
