Publisher	Milton Bradley
Players	2
Age range	7 and up
Playing time	10 minutes
Random chance	None
BoardGameGeek entry Image File history File links Connect_four_game. ... 1. ... For the Oakland Athletics outfielder, see Milton Bradley (baseball player) The Milton Bradley Company is an American game company established by Milton Bradley in Springfield, Massachusetts in 1860. ...

Connect Four (also known as Plot Four, Four in a Row, and Four in a Line) is a two-player board game in which the players take turns in dropping alternating colored discs into a seven-column, six-row vertically-suspended grid. The object of the game is to connect four singly-colored discs in a row -- vertically, horizontally, or diagonally -- before your opponent can do likewise. A board game is a game played with counters or pieces that are placed on, removed from, or moved across a board (a premarked surface, usually specific to that game). ...

The game was published under the famous Connect Four trademark by Milton Bradley in 1974; however, the much older original version is known as "The Captain's Mistress". For the Oakland Athletics outfielder, see Milton Bradley (baseball player) The Milton Bradley Company is an American game company established by Milton Bradley in Springfield, Massachusetts in 1860. ...

Perfect play

Connect Four at a bar in Pattaya, Thailand

Connect Four has been solved by James D. Allen (1 October 1988), and independently by Victor Allis (16 October 1988).^[1] With perfect play, the first player can force a win by starting in the middle column. Starting in the two adjacent columns allows the second player to reach a draw; starting with the four outer columns allows the second player to force a win. Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (3488x2616, 2152 KB) A game of Connect Four in a beer bar in Pattaya, Thailand, soi 2. ... Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (3488x2616, 2152 KB) A game of Connect Four in a beer bar in Pattaya, Thailand, soi 2. ... Beach Pattaya along the beach Pattaya (Thai: , RTGS: Phatthaya) is a city in Thailand, located on the east coast of the Gulf of Thailand ( ), about 165 km southeast of Bangkok located within but not part of Amphoe Bang Lamung in the province of Chon Buri. ... A two-player game can be solved on several levels. ... is the 274th day of the year (275th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1988 (MCMLXXXVIII) was a leap year starting on Friday (link displays 1988 Gregorian calendar). ... L. Victor Allis is a Dutch computer expert who works to find better ways of developing artificial intelligence. ... is the 289th day of the year (290th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1988 (MCMLXXXVIII) was a leap year starting on Friday (link displays 1988 Gregorian calendar). ... In game theory, perfect play is the behavior or strategy of a player which leads to the best possible outcome for that player, and if there are multiple options with the same outcome perfect play is usually considered the fastest method for getting a good result, or the slowest time...

The current Connect Four Champion is Graeme Bentley of Cambuslang, who forced a perfect play on his opponent Daniel Mandel, also of Arlington, Virginia, during the 2007 U.S. open.

References

1. ^ http://homepages.cwi.nl/~tromp/c4/c4.html

External links

Wikibooks has more on the topic of

Connect Four

• Victor Allis's Master's Thesis containing the solution of the game
• James D. Allen's page on Connect 4, his Expert Play in Connect 4, and John Tromp's history of solutions
• Connect Four, Score Four aka Connect Four Advanced and Connect Four Flip at BoardGameGeek
• Zero Gravity Connect Four Variation at The Problem Site