PWB1/usr/man/man6/othello.6

.th OTHELLO VI 5/31/77
.sh NAME
othello \*- a game of dramatic reversals
.sh SYNOPSIS
.bd /usr/games/othello
[ [
.bd \-r
]
.it file
]
.sh DESCRIPTION
.it Othello
(a.k.a
.it reversi
)
is played on an 8 by 8 board
using two-sided tokens.
Each player takes his turn by placing
a token with his side up in an empty square.
During the first four turns, players
may only place tokens in the four central squares
of the board.
Subsequently, with each turn, a player
.it must
capture one or more
of his opponents tokens.
He does this by placing
one of his tokens such that
he outflanks one or more
of his opponents',
horizontally, vertically or diagonally.
Captured tokens are flipped over
and thus can be re-captured.
If a player cannot outflank
his opponent he must forfeit
his turn.
The play continues until the
board is filled or until no more
outflanking is possible.
.s3
In this game,
your tokens are asterisks
and the machines' are at-signs.
You move by typing in the row and column
at which you want to place your token
as two digits (1-8),
optionally separated by blanks or tabs.
You can also type in
.s3
.lp +10 5
\fBc\fR	to continue the game after hitting break
(this is only necessary if you interrupt the machine
while it is deliberating),
.lp +10 5
\fBg\fR \fIn\fR	to start
.it othello
playing against itself
for the next \fIn\fR moves
(or until the break key is hit),
.lp +10 5
\fBn\fR	to stop printing the board after each move,
.lp +10 5
\fBo\fR	to start it up again,
.lp +10 5
\fBp\fR	to print the board regardless,
.lp +10 5
\fBq\fR	to quit (without dishonor),
.lp +10 5
\fBs\fR	to print the score, and, as always,
.lp +10 5
\fB!\fR	to escape to the shell. Control-D gets you back.
.i0
.s3
.it Othello
also recognizes several commands which are valid only
at the start of the game, before any moves have been made.
They are
.s3
.lp +10 5
\fBf\fR	to let the machine go first.
.lp +10 5
\fBh\fR \fIn\fR	to ask for a handicap
of from one to four corner squares.
If you're
.it really
good, you can give the machine
a handicap by typing a negative number.
.lp +10 5
\fBl\fR \fIn\fR	to set the amount of lookahead
used by the machine in searching for moves.
Zero means none at all. Four is the default.
Greater than six means you may fall asleep
waiting for the machine to move.
.lp +10 5
\fBt\fR \fIn\fR	to tell
.it othello
that you will only need \fIn\fR seconds
to consider each move. If you fail to respond in the
allotted time, you forfeit your turn.
.i0
.s3
If
.it othello
is given a file name as an argument,
it will checkpoint the game,
move by move, by dumping the board onto
.it file.
The
.bd \-r
flag will cause
.it othello
to restart the game from
.it file
and continue logging.
.sh DIAGNOSTICS
Illegal! and Huh?