The other day I was digging through some things and happened upon a game I made several years ago. I built it and shopped it around, but didn't get any takers. I was thinking that I'll send it out again. In short, Obelisk is a 3D head-to-head tetris-like game. I'd be happy to get any suggestions to changes in the rules, or the pieces. I know it's tough without playing it, but you never know, maybe there's some inspired game designers out there. The rules follow:
- The Game: Obelisk is a head-to-head game of skill that pits player’s spatial-reasoning skills against one another.
The objective: The objective of Obelisk is to score as many points as possible before the game has ended. Points are scored by placing blocks upon one’s tower. Blocks have the following point values:
Black block (1 cube volume): -2 points. Yellow block (2 cube volume): 0 points. Red block (3 cube volume): 1 point. Green block (4 cube volume): 2 points. Blue block (5 cube volume): 3 points.
Points for each player are totaled at the end of a game. To total points, each player determines the combined value of all blocks that are on his or her tower when the game ends. The game is ended when a turn ends and one or both players have placed a block that exceeds the height of their tower (more than nine cubes tall).
How to play: To begin a game of Obelisk, each player removes all blocks from his or her tower, and places all the blocks (except for the 4 black blocks) in between the two opponents so they may all be seen clearly by both. The 4 black blocks are placed to the side, out of play.
A coin toss decides who will go first.
1: The first turn begins. The player going first chooses any two blocks from the ‘common pile’, and places them to the side of the common pile in an area called the ‘building zone’. This player choosing blocks from the common pile is called the ‘active player’. The active player has 1 minute to choose two blocks and to place them in the building zone. A minute hourglass timer is provided for each player to keep track of this time.
2: Once the active player places two blocks within the building zone, the other player, called the ‘passive player’, may select one block from the building zone that she wishes to place on her tower. The remaining block must be placed by the active player upon his tower. When the passive player decides which block to place, she gives the remaining block to the active player.
3: The active player places the block given to him by the passive player upon his tower.
4: The passive player places the block she chose from the building zone upon her tower. The first turn has ended.
5: A second turn begins. The passive player of the first turn becomes the active player of the second turn, and visa versa. The new active player now chooses any two blocks from the common pile and places them in the building zone. This sequence of turns repeats until upon the end of a turn, one of the players has a block that exceeds the height of his or her tower (if his or her tower is more than 9 cubes tall).
Ending the game: A game of Obelisk ends when after a turn, one or both of the players has placed a block that exceeds the height of his or her tower. If a player has placed such a block, the player must do two things.
1: The player must determine how many cubes of the block have exceeded the tower’s height. This number is subtracted from the player’s final point total. A tower’s height is 9 cubes tall. This is the same height as the 9 tower rods. Thus, if a placed block exceeds the height of a tower rod, the game will end. For example: If a player had last placed a red block (3 cube volume) that had two of its cubes over his tower’s height, he would subtract 2 from his final point total.
2: The player must remove the block exceeding the tower’s height and place it in the common pile. This block is not scored.
Once the player or player’s have resolved any blocks that exceed the tower’s height, each player removes all the blocks from his or her tower, and totals the combined points of their blocks. For example: A tower that contained 1 black block, 1 yellow block, 2 red blocks, 7 green blocks, and 5 blue blocks would have a point total (or score) of 29. [That is: (1 x -2) + (1 x 0) + (7 x 1) + (5 x 3) = 29] If this player had a block that exceeded his tower’s height by 3 cubes, his final score would be 26.
The player with the highest point total wins the game of Obelisk.
Other rules: Building: When placing a block upon a tower, the block may not overhang outside the 3 x 3 area of the tower. Or, in other words, a tower rod must pass through each hole of a block that is placed on the tower.
Flats and black blocks: If, at any time after a turn a player’s tower is flat on top, he or she may place one black single cube block upon his or her opponent’s tower. This black block is placed before the next turn, and may be placed anywhere on the opponent’s tower. A ‘flat’ is achieved when all nine spaces of a player’s tower are level. The black block has a value of -2 points.
Handling blocks: Only an active player may handle blocks in the common pile. Once both blocks are placed in the building zone, only the passive player may handle the blocks in the building zone.
When players are permitted to pick up blocks, they may handle them and rotate them. However, neither player may place any block upon his or her tower until the passive player has given one of the two building zone blocks to the active player.
Active player time limit: The active player has 1 minute to choose two blocks and to place them in the building zone. If one minute has passed and the active player has not done so, the active player has lost his or her turn. If this occurs, any block in the building zone is returned to the common pile, and the passive player becomes the active player, and visa versa.
The passive player has no time limit when choosing blocks from the building zone.
A black block exceeds the tower height: If a game ends with a black block placed that exceeds a tower’s maximum height, its player subtracts 1 from his or her final point total. However, like all blocks that exceed the tower’s maximum height, the black block is placed in the common pile before scoring of blocks begins.
Game pieces: The Obelisk game contains the following components: 2 towers. 4 black blocks. 4 yellow blocks. 4 red blocks. 15 green blocks. 12 blue blocks. 2 one-minute hourglasses.
EDIT: In short, players add blocks to their own tower, trying to pack pieces as tight as possible so as not to be the first one to go over the top. Each turn one player chooses two pieces, then the other picks first from these two. This alternates until someone goes more than 9 blocks high. Bigger pieces score more points.