Othello

To put the last page first for any achievement hunters, the online servers are no longer in service; ergo, achievement hunting will not yield you a 100%.

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For offline purposes, though, Othello is an interesting game, likable in its simplicity and great for anyone who wants to go back to when the wonders of reckoner-gaming included board games on a screen.

The rules are simple enough that the game is easy-ish to grasp, and there's enough flexibility for there to be room for actual planning and skill, like this game was made to whisper of the missed potential of Tic Tac Toe.

The visual design, font, pop-up windows, and gameplay repeal the oppressive noise of modern gaming and harken to, again, when wonder was simple enough and life and our hobbies felt slow enough for us to actually take a breath and enjoy what we're interfacing with.

I see now that it's not on the Steam Store anymore. That's a shame. If this decision is ever reversed, though, or if you yourself have a digitized copy of Othello, I encourage you to take a crack at it.

Unfortunately I can't recommend this game (which I see has been withdrawn at the request of the developer / publisher, but I suppose my comments might still bring some benefit if the original developer or another is inclined to have another crack at it).

The good:
-The AI plays a very strong game. Because of the way the game works, the number of counters of your colour bears little relationship to the end position until just a few moves before.
-The graphics are very passable.

The bad:
There are some things which in my view are essential to a serious game of this kind and I think would have been easy to implement but haven't been.
1) The ability to save the game. How hard would it have been to save a few bytes to the drive? Preferably unlimited named saves but even a "Resume previous game" would have been welcome
2) An "undo" function. It would have really helped my game to be able to see where I might have made a better move.

In my view these are the very minimum features necessary for a paid implementation of Othello. But I can think of another couple of facilities that would be very nice to have, and don't seem to me likely to be very complicated...
3) The ability to save the sequence of moves in a game (as in chess notation) both as text, and as a file to be loaded and analysed move by move
4) The ability to set up a position on the board and play from there.

I'm surprised more reviewers haven't commented on the lack of these features. Perhaps I'm just too picky.

Buy it on sale.

It's well made, and enjoyable for what it is, but what it is isn't much.

It's the sort of thing that you'd expect to come as part of a "collection," or nestled in a larger title as a minigame.

But as of now, no such things exist, and at ~$2.49, this is not a difficult decision. Support these guys and, who knows, maybe they'll invest in making this (or a "sequel") more fully featured, maybe devising some new, creative variations a la Tetris or something.

I have Linux Mint and unfortunately the AI is broken. I paid for this and I expect the computer to work. If your getting this to play with a friend locally then it should be fine but if your playing single player on linux then the AI may not work.

The game itself is REALLY buggy on the Mac, very often skipping the AI's turn for no reason. Also there's no analysis mode. So no proper AI game, and no analysis. I can't believe a game of such low quality is on Steam. I regret buying this - don't make the same mistake as me.

This game is awful. I had to request a refund it was so bad. The AI player wouldn't take their turn and the whole game just froze. I would highly recommend avoiding this game.

Othello is a adversarial strategy board game; although it's very different to Checkers, in some ways it's similar (at the least, that comparison should give people an idea of what genre of game it is).
It is not as complicated as Chess, but it can be very hard to win against a good opponent - as the line on the original box says, "A minute to learn ... A lifetime to master".

I used to play Othello as an actual board game (years ago); and then played an earlier computer version, which was called "Iago" (the latter was presumably named after Iago, a character in Shakespeare's play "Othello").

This computer version of Othello is quite good.
There are several settings available to play against the AI: Beginner, Easy, Medium, Hard, Harder, and Hardest.
However, I've found that it crashes a lot - especially when it looks like I'm going to beat the AI on the "Harder" setting ("Yay, I'm going to win this time ... I'm going to beat it ... this is going well ... aw, geez, it's crashed again!"), which can be really annoying.

The game also has multiplayer options, so you can either set your brain against the AI or versus some human players (provided that you can find an opponent online at the same time as yourself - which may be easier said than done; although you always have the option of arranging some matches against a friend).

Despite the too-often crashes, I still quite enjoy the game.
For anyone who enjoys Checkers, Chess, or similar games, Othello is worthwhile taking a look at.

A classic board game with working versus AI, local, and online multiplayer. I've had good fun playing friends online across the country aside from the occasional crash. UI is really ugly and is only servicable. Get it when it's on sale and make sure its a 2-pack so you can actually play with someone since online is dead.

Good ol' classic Othello.

Game is fluid, graphic is crisp and clear, AI is very good. Moreso, it has hotseat and internet/online play.

Recommended.

I luv Othello which is one of my most favorite games.
Its simple and easy to play, but quite addictive and your hooked.
I had no problems with playing the game and the UI works great.
The graphics are very nice and its easy to learn and play this game.
Thanks very much. Great job. I bought this game and its worth it.

I remember playing Othello aka Reversi with my grandparents. It is an all time favorite. Something we would sit around, play, and talk about random stuff. Some of my fondest memories are around this game. If you love this type of game, its great. It has Player vs Computer, Local Multiplayer, and Online Multiplayer. I love it.

I don't like this game apparently. I don't mean this actual game, I mean othello or whatever people refer to it as. It wasn't my cup of tea, to say the least.

The AI is great and actually offers a challenge, or it could be that I was so bad that even the low level AI's were better than me. Regardless, if you can't play against people online for some reason, the computer seems to be plenty good enough to challenge you. It also allows you to play versus your friend through couch co op, it looks like.

Overall, this game is smooth and worth your time, if you like reversi/othello to begin with. I didn't enjoy it but that's not the developer's fault or anything so don't blame him. Also, the developer was responding to just about every thread in the discussion forum so that is pretty phenomenal.

Get this game if you like reversi/othello and you won't be disappointed. Promise.

A simple but challenging board game. There's ELO ranking and it notifies you via steam whenever it is your turn to play.

It's pretty fun with friends. Get it on a sale.

First of all, these reveiwers saying this is not "Reversi" but actually "Othello" I have no idea what they are talking about. I've been playing Reversi/Othello for a long time, as well as have been researching board and card games, and I have never encountered a version that didn't start with four pieces in the center, and I've always found "Reversi" and "Othello" used interchangeably. But games like this are old and acquire many rules over time. Who can really say, and does it really matter that much?

Now, as for the game itself, don't buy it unless it's on a pretty heavy sale. I waited until it fell down to about $3, and had I paid a dime more than that I'd have been pretty upset. While functional it lacks polish. Only two varieties of pieces, no varieties of boards or backgrounds. The background music is annoying with no other options. The sound effects are grating. Seems like small stuff, but they are all things that should be present for $10 whole wing-wangs. In 3-D mode the pieces flip over in a very satisfying way, but if you make a large capture the computer goes immediately after while your pieces are still flipping. And if you make a large capture, and the computer makes a large capture, your first pieces could be flipping back before your captured pieces are finished turning over. I find it to be incredibly annoying.

All of these seems like small complaints and they are, but to be charging $10 I'd expect a lot more. I'd expect a lot more especially when you can just google "Reversi" or "Othello" and find a low tech flash version on a website and play for free. So save your $10 and put it towards a real Othello/Reversi board you can buy at any Toys'R'us.

Very buggy. The AI often say "the AI has no moves, its your turn again" - however there is a lot of moves for the AI to do. The game crashes a lot on my Mac (mid-game) and I have not one single time succeed to play against another player (ranked). Money back please!!!

There are stability issues, the game crashes often in the middle of a match. It's nowhere near as good or as fun as Freeverse Software's late, lamented REVERSI: THE ECLIPSE, which was everything that this game is not in terms of design and playability and entertainment value. But -- that game is defunct, and this is the only game of its type (that I'm aware of) now available to me... so I guess for the price I can't complain. I'm basically glad to have it, it's nice to have a game or two in the collection that you can play QUICKLY without a big time involvement.

これはオセロです
それ以上でもそれ以下でもありません
オンラインで対戦が出切るのでフレンドと一緒によく対戦しています
１ゲーム大体10分から１５分で終わります

ちょっとした暇つぶしには最高です！

Game runs fine so far with no problems but no one is online to play against.

+ Clean and fast inteface.
+ A.I. is great with many difficulty settings to suit your skill level.
+ Local Multi-player
+ Steam Achievements, Cards..etc.

Side-Note: this is Othello not Reversi and here is why:
1- In Reversi, the starting configuration was not predetermined, like it is in Othello and here. Players would take turns setting down the first four pieces in the center of the board. Because of this, either player could force the “parallel” starting configuration (White White Black Black), rather than the predetermined Othello starting configuration (White Black Black White).
2- In Reversi, the game is over as soon as either player could not make a move. In Othello and this game, the player without a move simply passes, and the other player makes as many moves as needed before the first player can make a move again. The game is only over once neither player can make a move.

I originally thought this was Othello. Cleared up my a fellow gamer here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reversi

Despite the occasional crash - it is the game that I enjoyed playing as a kid.

I am enjoying it now - despite the *complete* lack of people available to play multiplayer....! Not sure if thats a bug or I am the only person playing.

It should be 3 or 4 dollars not 6 or 9.

7/10