Parqués



Parqués is a Colombian board game in the Cross and Circle family (the category that includes Pachisi). The game is a random thinking game, that is, it is guided by the values of the dice but the player must think before making his move before, thus, not being entirely random. The objective of the game is to advance all the pieces to the end.

Colombia’s origin
The game is invented in Colombia, it is an adaptation of the Pachisi, from India. It is very popular in that country, people from all parts of it play the game. They usually play it betting money for first piece, eating pieces and winning the game. There are boards for 4 up to 8 players. The boards usually contain pictures of soccer teams, singers or actors on the jails.

Basic instructions
Parqués is played with two dice and two to six players can compete in the same match. Each player is given 4 pieces (although it can be played with 1 to 4 pieces) and he uses a special color. Most common colors are red, blue, yellow and green, usually arranged in that order (see top screenshot).

The jail box is where the pieces are placed at the beginning of the match and it is where they get whenever an opponent captures them. The player must throw the dice three times to try to get a pair in order to free the pieces. A pair is got the player gets the same value on both dice, as 2-2 or 5-5. There are two types of pairs:


 * 1-1 or 6-6; the player can free all his pieces
 * Otherwise: 2-2, 3-3, 4-4, 5-5; the player can free 2 pieces only

When the pieces are freed, they are placed in a special box next to the jail. This box is called HOME (SALIDA, in Spanish). See information for special boxes below.

If he makes his tries and no pair is got, he passes his turn to the player on his right. Otherwise, he frees the pieces and wins an extra turn to move them. He throws again and must move the values of the dice with his pieces. For instance:

He gets 5-3
 * He can move 8 squares forward with one piece         or
 * He can move 5 squares with one piece and 3 with another

After he makes his move, he must pass his turn to the player on the right.

The pieces cannot advance backwards and they cannot be in any of the four boxes before their HOME box.

Throws and turns
Each player can throw the dice once. There are some exceptions to this rule:


 * If the player has all his pieces in jail, he can throw three times until he frees them with a pair. Otherwise, he passes the turn.
 * If the player throws a pair at any moment, for example a 4-4, he wins an extra turn.

Capturing pieces
The player can capture an opponent’s piece by placing his own piece on the same box as the other player’s piece. However, he cannot capture if the other player is on a SAFE or a HOME box. Capturing in Colombia is called “eating” (“comer” in Spanish).

However, the player can capture pieces on his HOME box. When he frees any piece from jail, the pieces placed on his HOME are captured, that is, sent to its jail, losing all their advances.

The player can avoid capturing the piece. On that case, an opponent has to accuse him and the piece that did not capture must go to jail. If nobody notices, nothing happens.

Special boxes
There are three types of special boxes.


 * HOME: where the pieces are placed when freed.
 * SAFE: the pieces cannot be captured on this box (See capture section below)
 * ARRIVAL: These are 9 cases where the owner player gets. They are usually of the same color of the player. The 9th box is the last box in the game for each person. If a piece is moved there, it gets out of the game. When all pieces are out of the game, the player wins.