We are grateful to James Prucey for this marvel of a game;
With its mix of luck and strategy, it's never quite the same;
Though it used to need an iPhone, now we all can praise its name;
Oh Lock 'n' Roll, ROCK ON!

The Great War of Prefectures plays like a cross between Risk and an RTS, with Japan's prefectures (analogous to other countries' states or provinces) serving as the territories you fight over. Despites some interface flaws, this game has that elusive quality that will bring you back for more even after you thought you'd had enough.

Tantrix is a friendly one-player version of the 1988 board game by Mike McManaway, a game that may not have the renown of Scrabble or chess, but still attracts devoted players for annual tournaments. Try to form loops of a single color out of specially-designed hexagonal tiles, in either a puzzle mode or the more improvisational Solitaire mode.

These puzzles are the same type of chess mind-benders that still appear in some newspapers next to the word jumble and bridge game brainteasers. Given an endgame position consisting of a few pieces, try to produce checkmate in a given number of moves. The difficulty curve eases you in gradually, and if you're good enough, you can tackle 650 unique puzzles. Regardless of your Elo rating, you'll find a challenge that will suit you with MateMaster.

A dice game of luck and strategy, race against the computer (or a friend) to 10,000 points. Earn points by rolling 1's and 5's, or by rolling 3 or more of a kind, or several other special configurations worth big points. Also known under a variety of different names, Zilch is definitely one of those games that's "easy to learn, hard to master."

Zombie in My Pocket is the quintessential casual game: quick to play, easy to learn, solitaire and free. But it differs from the usual Jay is Games fare in one crucial respect: the platform on which it plays is not Windows, Mac or Linux, but rather your kitchen table.

A marble placement, turn-based strategy game. The goal is to be the first player to place five marbles in a row. The rows can be vertical, horizontal, or diagonal. The game is a bit like Connect Four, but with a twist. Pentago is an award-winning board game from Sweden, and this Flash version allows you to play in a browser.

Dangerous High School Girls in Trouble is an innovative and award-winning download game for both Mac and Windows that defies classification. It's a unique genre-bending game that includes puzzle and RPG elements, as well as a variety of mini-games. All these disparate elements synthesize remarkably well, and the gameplay quickly becomes intuitive.

Another popular television game show to make the leap to the casual gaming world. The classic "guess the most popular answer" formula is as exciting on your computer as it is on TV, only now it's much more interactive than just yelling at the screen. With over 3,000 questions to ponder and a tacked-on home decorating game, you won't have a hard time finding an excuse to guess what the "survey says".

Proximity is a classic turn-based strategy Flash game that is somewhat like a cross between Risk and Go. It is surprisingly simple to learn and takes about 5 minutes to play. You can play against the computer, or against a friend at the same computer.

Coming out of Wildsnake Software, from the chilled steppes of Russia, comes an entry into our 4th Casual Gameplay competition: Chap Hai - Way Of The Dragon. But what is the "Way Of The Dragon"? Does it involve superhuman martial arts, or maybe a method of braising reptile meat? Actually, it involves flicking marbles at each other. It's Zen baby.

BrettspielWelt is a free, online board-gaming community based in Germany but open to players from around the world. Many excellent board and card games, ranging from casual fun to serious strategy can be played online in one place: BrettspielWelt ("board game world").

Torus Games from Jeff Weeks and Geometrygames.org is the name of a free downloadable set of 8 simple games for Windows and Mac that, rather than being played on a 2-D plane, are played on the surface of a torus. Here you will find a twist on classic games like tic-tac-toe, pool, Minesweeper (called Apples here), and even a bizarre version of chess.

Blokus is a quality, turn-based abstract strategy game in which you are in charge of 21 Tetris-like pieces ranging from one to five squares. Your goal is to place as many of them on the board as possible, following only two placement rules: 1) Your first piece must start in your corner; and 2) All subsequent pieces must be placed diagonally (and only diagonally) adjacent to one of your already-played pieces.

The Four Color Problem is a simple turn-based game in which the goal is to color in as much space on a map as you can, while a computer opponent tries to do the same. The catch is that no two adjacent areas can be filled with the same color. Can you dominate the majority of the map with your color?

Similar to the classic game Rack-O, Tower Blaster puts you in a race against the Viking hordes in a randomly-assorted tower of numbered blocks to must arrange them in order from lowest at the top to highest at the bottom. Finish your tower before your opponent finishes theirs, else the mighty Viking Axe destroys your own tower and the game is over.

Get the Glass is a 3D board game produced as a part of a new Got Milk advertising campaign in the US. The object of the game is to get the Adachi family around the board and into Fort Fridge so that they can...erm...Get the Glass. It's an absolutely beautiful game with gorgeous scenery and surprisingly smooth animation.

Quadradius is an online, multiplayer, turn-based Flash game that takes the skeleton of the board game checkers, and pumps it up with a massive list of power-ups and new strategies that turns the game into an addictive and very compelling new concept. In fact, calling it checkers is an oversimplification that does not do it any justice.

Doctor Who Cyber Assault (or Cyberman) is a Risk!-like game from the BBC that incorporates several minigame-like elements into the main game. Move your units around the board to conquer new territory, then try and outwit your opponent with rock-paper-scissors-type fights. And when you take a territory with an enemy base, get ready for some gun-firing action.

With almost 10 years in the making, Sanctum from Nioga is a very unique game. The best way to describe it would be to say it's like combining chess with Magic the Gathering in a miniature game board setting. It could be one of those classic board games we played as a child, except this game is all digital and played only online.

Dice Wars is a unique new turn-based strategy game from Japan. Using nothing but dice and a randomly generated territory map made of hexagons, the game is similar in gameplay to that of the board game, Risk, though much simpler and quicker to play. The objective is to conquer all territories and eliminate all your opponents by attacking them with dice.

Travian is a browser-based, massively multiplayer, quasi-real-time strategy game, developed and maintained by a German team dedicated to its upkeep. The goal is to build up economic and military power through the development of land and construction of buildings and armies.

American History Lux is a downloadable war strategy game that takes a remarkably boring subject and turns it into a simple but epic game. It's a whittled-down version of Sillysoft's more Lux Delux title, making it perfect for casual world-conquerors. The game plays a lot like Risk with a few extras and is available for Windows, MacOS X and Linux.

Toulouse is played with three to five human or computer players, and a well designed interface and beautiful presentation make this web-based version user friendly and highly enjoyable. The folks at AsoBrain.com have also recently added the option of playing with up to two expansions to the original board game, making this as involved a Carcassonne experience as one could hope for.

Since Jay and I have been so hopelessly busy playing Cry Wolf, I offered last night to write a review for a game that was mentioned in passing in a previous post, Sea3d, also known as Settlers of Catan. Settlers is a board game that's been around for a number of...

At first glance, it appears to be a Towers of Hanoi puzzle, and maybe that is why I did not play this game the first time it crossed my path. Not because I view Towers of Hanoi unworthy, for it's a classic puzzle game and one that is often used to teach recursive algorithms in programming. I passed on it because I thought it was unoriginal.

According to the myth, Theseus goes into the labyrinth to slay the minotaur. Inside, he uses a piece of yarn that was given to him by his love, Ariadne, to mark his trail so he is able to find his way back out in the dark. In Kreta, however, you must enter the labyrinth as Ariadne and save Theseus before he becomes Minotaur feed.

Manuel Fallmann's latest offering on his MINDistortion site is a turn-based strategy game against the CPU, or a human opponent at the same computer. The object of Quarkz is to be the first player to reach the number of points designated as the victory condition by adding particles to the...

File this under: Games as an art form. While I do not often find myself playing Chess (read: I suck at it), I do like to play when I find a game that offers something besides the mere basics. Thinking Machine 4 is just such a game. The authors state that the goal of the piece is not to make an expert chess playing program but to lay bare the complex thinking that underlies all strategic thought.

For all the classic board gamers, as well as for those who were searching the site for one the other day, here is a Shockwave multiplayer Backgammon game from Nabisco. A simple menu gets you playing right away, just click on 'Join Any Open Game'. Once there are two players, click the 'Yes' button to start. If no one shows up, you can click the butt...

These beautiful Flash casino games were created by Eugene Potapenko and are available to play on his website flash.init(). Each game has been given extraordinary attention to detail right down to the wood grain finish on the tables. You won't get rich playing these games, but you won't lose any money either. Choose between: American Roulette, Bacc...

Almost twenty years ago, I would often play a solitaire game on the Mac called Shanghai that used Chinese Mahjongg tiles for play. Created by Brodie Lockard and released by Activision in 1986, Brodie is credited with the original idea, programming and artwork for the game. Since then there have been many clones and copycat versions, but most still ...

Similar to games like Go and Othello, this Shockwave game from The Jab is all about turning the tiles (or I suppose 'nodes' in this case) to your color. It's really simple to pick up and play, and yet the possibilities for each move become many. Frustrating and difficult, the challenge is fun if you put a little time into examining how each move affects the play.

Played just like the old plastic game of Battleship that used red and white pegs to record hits and misses, except this Flash version does all the hard work for you. First position your fleet on the board, then all you have to do is click on a square to fire torpedoes.

If you like board games and you like playing against others over the Internet, give Conqueror! a try. This full-featured, multiplayer, turn-based strategy game is very similar to Risk, and yet its gameplay is a lot richer. An ingenious system of simultaneous turns means that you don't have to wait for other players to make their moves.

What may be one of the oldest games ever played, Mancala is simple to learn and yet difficult to master. This cute Flash version of the game is played using snails for stones and features both single player and multiplayer modes of play. Created by the talented folks at RocketSnail Games in British Columbia.

Lately, I've been wanting to play a game, called Mastermind, that I used to play a lot when I was in high school, but couldn't find a decent version of it anywhere online. The versions I did find were either buggy or weren't much to look at. So I made a better one.