Ring True
Hit one, or yours comes off.
What it is
Crokinole, the round wooden board game from Ontario, seen from above. Flick discs from the edge of your quarter toward the hole in the middle: a disc that drops in scores 20, and the rings around it score 15, 10 and 5. A disc touching a line scores the lower ring, and a disc in the hole counts 20 for its owner, whoever knocked it in.
If any of the other side’s discs is on the board, your shot has to hit one or your disc comes off, so every turn is a choice between going for the 20 and knocking them into the ditch. On an empty board, your shot has to stop inside the 15 line. Each side has twelve discs a round; after each round only the side ahead scores, and only the difference. First to 100 wins.
The board is measured from a real one: a 26-inch playing surface with the 15, 10 and 5 lines 4, 8 and 12 inches from the centre, eight pegs on the 15 line, a 1⅜-inch hole and 1¼-inch discs.
Play the computer, or sit two people at opposite ends of one phone or tablet. Nothing steers a disc, and the computer plays the same board you do: its only error is in how it flicks. It gets sharper after you win and gentler after you lose. Red discs carry a ring and black discs a dot, so the two sides differ by more than colour.
How to play
- Sit downTouch your end of the board
- FlickPull back behind your disc, let go
- Move along the lineDrag your disc sideways
- Add a second playerTwo players? Tap here
The board plays itself until you sit down. Put a finger behind your disc and pull back, like a slingshot: the disc goes the other way, and the further you pull, the harder it goes. A short pull, a second finger or sliding off the screen never flicks. The aim line shows the first thing your disc will touch, and only that. Put the phone down mid-game and it waits for you: nothing takes your seat away.
On a desktop, drag back from behind your disc with the mouse, just as by touch. Or use the keys: Left and Right aim (Shift for fine), A and D slide your disc along the line, and holding Space and letting go flicks. The longer the hold, the harder the flick, with full power at a second and a half. Enter sits down or plays again, and M turns the sound on and off.
What isn’t settled yet
Two people at most. The board has four quarters, but there are no seats yet for four players or for partners.
You can’t pick the computer’s strength: it steps up after you win and down after you lose. Its gentlest level always shoots from straight in front of it; the stronger levels use the whole line.
A game to 100 often runs past ten minutes, which is long for a short wait. There are no tournament rounds and no practice board.
Build Log
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Build 1
The hole in the middle is only an eighth of an inch wider than a disc. A disc crossing it stays up until its centre is within 0.29 inches of the middle, where nothing is left under it, and drops only if it is slow enough there. Worked out from the board’s own measurements rather than tuned, it lets the computer’s strongest level sink about two open twenties in three, as strong tournament players do.
Credits and licences
No third-party engine — it draws to a plain canvas. The typefaces it does use are embedded under the SIL Open Font Licence, with the copyright notice retained in the shipped file. Cover drawn from the game’s own board and disc code.
Ring True is original work by Launchway Games.