Mancala Board Games

Mancala board games offer a form of entertainment that can be enjoyed by all ages. Whether you’re 6 or 70, Mancala board games will hone your wits for hours on end. Best of all, due to the game’s simplicity, it can be played virtually with almost anything. Some people even make their own version of Mancala if they can’t find the ‘official’ Mancala board using stones and bowls.
So, how does Mancala work? Basically, Mancala board games consist of a gaming board with fourteen cups. Twelve of the cups are featured in the middle of the board. They are somewhat smaller in size than the cups at the end. These larger cups are on located at the end of the board, with one on the right side and the other on the left side.
Anyway, Mancala board games begin with an equal number of game pieces in each of the 12 smaller cups. During gameplay, players must ‘sow’ their seeds by picking a cup and spreading the seeds in a counter-clockwise motion. This process starts off from whatever side one is playing from, though depending on how gameplay goes, one may find themselves sowing seeds into their opponent’s cup.
But the fun doesn’t end there. If the player reaches the larger cup on their side of the Mancala game board, they are allowed to drop in a seed. And, the more seeds they can drop in this section the better, since this helps determine who will win the game.
Mancala ends when a player doesn’t have any more seeds in the smaller cups on their side of the board. It can also end by determining who has more Mancala in the larger cups at the end of the board. Either way, getting up to this point will require strategy and mathematical skill on behalf of both of the players. However, since the game is still very basic, it can be enjoyed by anyone who can count. In fact, some of Mancala’s best players are those who are in elementary school! In conclusion, if you’re looking for a different kind of fun, consider Mancala board games. Not only is the setup extremely easy, but if you lose the seeds, you can always replace them with something else, whether it’s coins, rocks or really anything else that is smaller in size. Design is not important, since Mancala board games rely on counting. No relationships are formed between the game pieces themselves. If there is a variation, it’s usually when it comes to aesthetics or how many seeds are used during gameplay.
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