Star is a two-player abstract strategy board game developed by Craige Schensted (now Ea Ea). It was first published in the September 1983 issue of Games magazine. It is a connection game similar to Hex, Y, Havannah, and TwixT. Unlike these games, however, the result is based on a player having a higher final score rather than achieving a specific goal. He has since developed a slightly more complicated version called *Star with better balance between edge and center moves, writing "*Star is what those other games wanted to be." Game rules Star is played on a board of hexagonal cells. Although the board can have any size and shape, a board with unequal edges is generally used to avoid ties. Players may not place stones on the partial hexagon border cells off the edge of the board; these are used for scoring. One player places black stones on the board; the other player places white stones. The game begins with one player placing a stone on the board. To avoid giving an advantage to the first player, a pie rule is used, allowing the second player to switch sides at that point. Players then alternate turns, placing a stone on an empty cell on the board. Players may pass; the game is over when both players pass. At the end of the game the players count their scores. A "star" is a group of connected stones belonging to one player that touches at least three partial-hex border cells. The score of a star is the number of partial-hex border cells it touches minus two. A player's score is the total of all the stars of that player's color. The player with the higher score wins. For any given board, the total final score of the two players is constant. The combined score of the two players is equal to the number of partial-hex border cells, less two. Example This 5×6 board has 75 cells in 10 rows (1–10) and 11 columns (A–J) which touch 33 partial-hex border cells. White has five distinct stars with a total net score of 14. The star touching cell [A2] contacts 6 border cells and has a net score of 4 points Touching [B1], 8 border cells; net score 6 Touching [D8], 3 border cells; net score 1 Touching [H10], 3 border cells; net score 1 Touching [J5], 4 border cells; net score 2