OpenKropki

OpenKropki is a free, open-source take on kropki - the classic Eastern European pen-and-paper "dots" game. It runs on Linux, BSD and Windows, and is released under the MIT license.

You may know the game as kropki (Polish), точки (Russian), židi (Czech/Slovak) or крапки (Ukrainian). Same idea everywhere: a notebook grid, two pens, and a friendly urge to surround the other player.

It is Go's cheerful cousin, adapted for squared paper:

Players take turns placing one dot on an empty grid intersection.
Close a fence of your dots around enemy dots to form a base - captured dots score points, and the pocket is sealed.
Nobody may play inside a finished base, but a larger surrounding fence can still capture a whole base later. Territory can flip!
When the board is full, the player who captured more enemy dots wins.

Play against a friend on the same computer, or challenge the built-in AIs - from cheerful Dumbo to sharper tacticians like Tigran and Viktor, plus Bender for fast territorial play.

Download

OpenKropki 0.5 for Linux and BSD (.tar.xz)
OpenKropki 0.5 for Windows x64 (.zip)

Older packages and source tarballs live in the archive.

Source code

Development happens in Subversion. Check out the full tree with:

svn co svn://svn.mateusz.fr/openkropki

Contact

Pointers live on the author's homepage.

A scrap of history

Kropki grew out of Go's popularity in the Soviet sphere during the 1970s. Proper kit was scarce and the full rulebook felt heavy for a school break, so people reinvented the spirit of surrounding on ordinary squared paper. Many variants appeared at once - no single inventor, just a contagious idea with a pen.