Backgammon — The Classic Dice Board Game

Info

Backgammon — Classic Dice Game — Roll the dice and bear off all 15 checkers first. Play 3 AI levels or a friend on one phone. Free to play on Google Play, with ads. 9 languages.

About the Game

Backgammon is a board game thousands of years old: roll two dice and move your checkers by the numbers. Each player races 15 checkers around the board into their home board, then bears them off. The first to bear off all 15 wins.

The dice play a big part, so even a first-timer can win, and after a few games you get a feel for where your checkers are safe. The board is drawn rotated for portrait screens, so every point is a wide row that is easy to tap.

How to Play

• Tap 🎲 Roll to throw two dice. Doubles are played four times
• Tap a checker and the points it can reach light up green. Moves that use both dice take a single tap
• Your checkers start at the bottom left and travel in a U shape to your home board (the last six points) at the bottom right. Your opponent moves the other way
• You cannot land on a point with two or more opposing checkers. Landing on a single one hits it and sends it to the bar in the middle — points where you would hit are marked in red
• If you have a checker on the bar, you must enter it first into your opponent’s home board at the bottom left
• Once all 15 checkers are home, you can bear them off
• You must use as many dice as possible, and if only one can be used, use the higher one. With no legal move, the turn passes automatically

If the loser bore off nothing, the result screen shows a gammon (×2); if they also still have a checker on the bar or in the winner’s home board, a backgammon (×3). There is no doubling cube, so each game stays quick and light.

Difficulty

• Easy: about the level where someone who just learned the rules wins half the time. It makes the odd strange move, but never misses a winning final move
• Normal: a good match once you know the rules. A newcomer can still win roughly one game in three
• Hard: weighs all 21 dice rolls the opponent could throw next before it moves. Clearly stronger than Normal — try it once you are comfortable

Features

• Vs Computer: Easy, Normal and Hard; you, the AI or random goes first
• 2-Player mode on the same device
• One standard 24-point board, no variants
• Pip counts for both sides are always on screen
• Reset your moves freely within a turn (↺ Reset), or undo your last turn
• Win/loss record for each level, a how-to-play guide with tips, and 9 languages

It is free to play and contains ads.

Gameplay Video

Download

• Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.fadongkwon.backgammon↗ (opens in a new tab)

Released Together

These board games came out on Google Play on the same day.

• Nine Men’s Morris — Line up three to capture rival pieces
• Hex — Link your two opposite sides of the hex board first
• Ultimate Tic-Tac-Toe — Tic-tac-toe on nine small boards
• Amazons — Move a queen, shoot an arrow and trap your rival

More board games: Gomoku · Reversi · Quick Go

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