Ikeda Rules

Ikeda Rules were forumlated by Ikeda Toshio in the 1960's and first published in a series of eleven articles that appeared between September 1968 and November 1969 in Igo Shincho. Fujitsu published a reworked collection of these articles under the title On the Rules of Go and online at GoBase. The rules alone are one line at GoBase, as well.

From the translator's, James Davies, introduction:

Ikeda attacked the rules problem with the same intensity he had shown in attacking the rotary motion of the telephone dial and the design of computers. He filled notebooks with handwritten rule analyses, lists of principles, diagrams, comparison charts, and drafts of new proposals....

In the course of these articles Ikeda revised his rules proposals several times. The final version, given in Part I of this book, consists of overlapping rulesets that share the same basic definitions and rules of play, but differ in how they end and score the game. Ikeda proposed three sets of Chinese-style area rules and two sets of Japanese-style territory rules. For completeness I have added a third set of territory rules.

The articles themselves form Part II. They are presented as they appeared in Igo Shincho with only minor editing, such as the insertion of a few parenthetical remarks and correction of mistakes in the diagrams. Some of Ikeda's comments about the Japanese rules are now out of date; updates are given in footnotes.

For a detailed commentary on Ikeda Territory Rules I by Robert Jasiek, please visit http://home.snafu.de/jasiek/ikeda.html.

Examples on Ikeda Territory Rules I by Robert Jasiek:

• Examples 1
• Examples 2
• Examples 3
• Examples 4
• Examples 5

Sometimes people refer to Ikeda's rule this is used as reference to Rule 7 of Ikeda's Area Scoring III.

See also

• Ikeda Area III Rules