Abstract board games come and go. If they manage to secure coverage in mainstream newspapers or magazines, they are invariably compared with Chess and heralded as the Next Big Thing. Almost equally invariably, they fade. They may maintain a few ongoing enthusiasts but they disappear from stockists' shelves and sadly few mourn their passing. That's not the case with John Yianni's Hive. The game first appeared almost a quarter of a century ago and it's still going strong; successfully having made the transition to mainstream retail outlets, including bookshops.
There's a notional theme in that the pieces are all named for insects or arachnids, and show them in outline. That doesn't make Hive thematically a game about insects any more than the bishops in Chess give that game a religious theme: Hive is an abstract two-player game. It's played without a board: the hexagonal pieces form the playing area as you place them. The satisfyingly chunky resin hex pieces and the game's inherent portability are part of Hive's lasting appeal; however, the key strength of Hive is its seeming simplicity: simple, straightforward rules that players of all ages can quickly grasp.
Each player has a Queen Bee piece and 10 other pieces. Your objective is to have your opponent's Queen Bee totally surrounded (ie: with a piece adjacent to it on all six sides, and that can mean pieces belonging to either player). Aside from the first turn - where each player places out a starting piece of their choice and places it adjacent to that of their opponent to start the Hive - the placement rules are that when you first place a piece it must be adjacent to another of your own colour and must not touch a piece of your opponent's colour. You must place out your Queen Bee piece within your first four turns. Once your Queen Bee is in play then, on your turn, as an alternative to placing a piece you can move one of the pieces you've previously placed.
This is where the different mini-beast depictions on the pieces come in (number of each type in parenthesis). The Queen Bee (1) can just move one space. The Spider (2) must move three spaces around the Hive. The Ant (3) can move any distance around the Hive. These pieces cannot move into a space they cannot slide into (ie: one already surrounded on five sides). The Grasshopper (3) can jump over a line of any number of both players' pieces and lands in the next vacant space. The Beetle (2) moves just one space, like the Queen Bee, but it can move on top of another piece. If it's on top of one of your opponent's pieces, it pins that piece. Both the Grasshopper and Beetle can drop into an otherwise closed off space.
The only other rule is that you cannot split the Hive: there must always be a continuous connection between all the pieces that are in play. It's this rule that's at the heart of much of the strategy in Hive. Players will typically jostle for positions that pin their opponent's pieces because their movement would separate other pieces from the Hive.
The 'easy to learn, hard to master' epithet is often bandied about in relation to games. With Hive tho' it's entirely appropriate. You can start playing immediately you open the package but it's only after you've played your first couple of games that you begin to spot and deploy the strategic possibilities opened up by the interaction between the various different pieces and that all-important rule of maintaining a continuous connection between all the pieces.
Publishers Gen42 have produced several different editions of Hive. All benefit from tactile playing pieces and are highly portable; indeed, the game comes with its own travel bag as standard. And in the unlikely event that you reckon you've totally perfected your winning strategies, there are three mini-expansions that you can add to your Hive: each adding a new white and black piece. If there's interest, we'll explain their special movement abilities and show them off too on Board's Eye View.
With or without its expansions, Hive is a game that's already shown its staying power. We'll be surprised if it's not still going just as strong in another quarter century.