Contigo – The Strategic Game of Programmed Moves

Contigo

The Strategic Game of Programmed Moves

3M Company – 1974 – 2 or 4 Players

Contigo is an alignment game for two players or a capture game for four players. The object of the two player game is for a player to get four pawns in a row (horizontally, vertically or diagonally) without any opposing pawns between them. The object of the capture game is to capture the key pawn of your opponents by landing on it with one of your own pawns.

Pawns can move vertically or horizontally but not diagonally. What makes the game tricky is that the pawns are limited in the moves they can make. Around the edge of the board are a series of pits that contain pebbles. A pawn must move a number of spaces equal to the number of pebbles in the pit it is moving towards.

A player moves the pebbles in the pits after they move a pawn. The player picks up one or more pebbles from a pit then drops them in one or more pits. The maximum distance a pebble can be moved is limited by the number of pebbles picked up. (If three pebbles are picked up then the pebbles can be moved up to three pits.)

This is an interesting strategy game that combines both peg puzzles and mancala-style pit and pebble games into a single game. It is harder than it looks as players are really playing two games at once; trying to maneuver both their pawns and arrange pebbles. What happens is that a player starts concentrating too much on one half of the game and fails on the other half.

The only downside to this game is that the components leave a bit to be desired. The pawns and pebbles are nice (though some of the pebbles in my set are fused together into a large mass) but the game board is quite flimsy and doesn’t look like it would hold up long under serious play. A stiffer board like that used for the earlier 3M games would be nice. Still, this is an interesting variant on several other games.