November 28, 2022 by Polar_Bear
I’m a fan of abstract strategy games. I’m also a fan of historical games. So, when you put the two together, I’m really interested. Shogi has been a traditional Japanese game for hundreds of years, with the Tori variant showing up somewhere in the 18th or 19th century. And there’s a beautiful version of it up on Kickstarter now.
From the campaign:
Tori Shogi is one of the known variants of the traditional Japanese board game Shogi. This variant was invented in the 18th-19th century during the Edo Era, before the modernization of Japan. “Tori”（禽） means birds, and all the pieces are named after birds.
Tori Shogi is considered from a different lineage than orthodox Shogi, and most of the pieces have movements that have nothing in common with it. A characteristic feature of tori shogi is that almost pieces have diagonal movements. This is reminiscent of the sharp movements of a bird swooping down on its prey.
Like orthodox Shogi, traditional Bird Shogi pieces are marked only in Kanji characters. My new portable version of the piece now includes the silhouette of the bird, its English name, and the direction in which it can move, in addition to the Kanji characters. This makes it easy for those who do not know the Kanji characters to distinguish the pieces and also eliminates the need to memorize the piece’s movement.
The campaign is up and running now with 15 days left to go.
Source: Tabletop Gaming News
