The perfect beach game

We spent the last week sightseeing and checking out a lot of cool stuff. 🛕🗿🌇 There was also a fair amount of travelling around in the back of a small bus 🚌, which was getting a bit much, so we are happy to arrive at the chill part of the holiday, where just have to rest and think about what to eat - and which of our travel-games to play. 😁

Today we brought 🐝 Hive Pocket to the beach 🏖️ with us. It is perhaps the most recommended 2p abstract game after Chess and Go, so I've been interested in trying it sometime. This holiday was the perfect opportunity to buy it. 🙃

To win the game you have to surround your opponent's Bee Queen from all 6 sides, while protecting your own Queen. The game is played with these super cool and sturdy hexagonal acrylic tiles, so they also lend themselves well to outdoor playtime. 👍 For now we are just tapping into the game, trying to learn the ropes, like you tend to do with abstract games. You usually find a lot of depth in these as you play.

You play one of your player-colored pieces every turn, always adjacent to your own color, or after you Bee is placed you can move one of your pieces in play, instead of bringing in a new one. This is the most interesting part of the game, as the different insects have different abilities.

Some examples just to give you a taste:
🪲 A beetle is slow but can move on top of other pieces, disabling them while there.
🦗 A grasshopper can jump through other pieces, but only in a straight line.
🕷️ Spiders can move on the edge of other pieces, but it has to be exactly 3 movements.

There are a lot more insects of course, and it's not that easy to see what will be a good move when you play for the first time… funny, how we both made the same mistakes in our first games 🤣. If you have played Hive: do you have any tips or favorite strategy?