⚫ Gomoku

About this game

Gomoku, also called Five in a Row or Gobang, is played on the intersections of a grid. Players take turns placing stones, and the first to get five of their own in an unbroken line, in any direction, wins. It is Tic Tac Toe grown up: the same idea of making a line, but on a board large enough for real depth.

What makes it a genuine strategy game rather than a bigger noughts and crosses is the double threat. Because five in a row is far away, most of the game is spent building shapes that threaten to complete in two places at once. Your opponent can block one, and you win with the other. Spotting and preventing these forks is the whole contest.

Controls

Tips & strategy

An open row of three, one with empty space on both ends, is the key threat. If your opponent ignores it, it becomes an open four, which cannot be stopped because it threatens to complete at either end. Learn to make open threes and to block your opponent's the moment they appear.

The winning weapon is the double threat: one stone that creates two separate ways to make five. Look for placements that extend two lines at once. Your opponent gets only one move to respond, so if you have made two threats, one of them survives.

Do not play passively by only blocking. If you spend every move stopping your opponent, you never build your own threats, and eventually they make a fork you cannot answer. The strongest defence is a counter-threat that forces them to respond to you instead.

Control the centre early. Lines radiate in all directions from central points, so a stone in the middle contributes to far more potential fives than one near an edge. Pushing play toward the sides shrinks your own options.