Gomoku (Stephan Wessels)

Gomoku, also called Five in a Row, is an abstract strategy board game. It is traditionally played with Go pieces (black and white stones) on a 15×15 Go board while in the past a 19×19 board was standard. Because pieces are typically not moved or removed from the board, gomoku may also be played as a paper-and-pencil game. The game is known in several countries under different names. This version was released by Stefan Wessels in 2023 for multiple 8 bit computers.

Players alternate turns placing a stone of their color on an empty intersection. Black plays first. The winner is the first player to form an unbroken line of five stones of their color horizontally, vertically, or diagonally. In some rules, this line must be exactly five stones long; six or more stones in a row does not count as a win and is called an overline. If the board is completely filled and no one has made a line of 5 stones, then the game ends in a draw.

The game plays a decent game of Gomoku on Hard AI. The medium and easy modes can be very easy - good for younger kids. If left at a menu or splash screen, the game will time-out and return to the splash screen from where it will start a demo mode. The demo mode is just two AIs of random skill playing against one-another.