Glass Bead Challenge

Glass Bead Challenge is a shareware strategy game for two players, one player vs the computer, or computer vs computer, it is entirely mouse controlled.

The game is played on a grid, not of lines but of spots. There are different grid sizes available ranging from 5x5 to 10x10. Glass beads are the tokens used in this game, hence its name, and when one is placed on a point it occupies that spot and, for now at least, owns the surrounding spots which change colour accordingly. When the next player takes their turn they cannot play on an occupy, however by playing on a nearby unoccupied spot they stake an equal claim to the owned spots which then change colour to neutral. This continues throughout the game with the owned spots switching from one colour to the other depending on which player occupies the most adjacent spots. The game ends when there are no more spots or valid moves to be made

In the shareware game the player can only play against the computer in ‘Novice’ mode, the registered version has both an Advanced computer opponent and an Expert opponent.