Play Hive Like a Champion: Strategy, Tactics and Commentary

OLD EDITION - This is a great book and I recommend it for anyone interested in bettering their Hive play, but the publisher needs to remove this edition from Amazon - there's a newer edition of the book available, with additional material covering the newest piece (the pillbug).Here's Amazon's listing for the 2nd edition: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1494476649If Amazon or the publisher updates this page with a notice at top ("There is a newer edition of this book available.") I will gladly change my rating.

Hive is an obscure game, but deserved a strategy guide.It is fortunately that Randy Ingersoll got involved -- this is one of the best abstract strategy game guides ever written. Profusely illustrated with hundreds of games, and a detailed explanation of all tactics.If you're a abstract strategy game collector, this is a book to own.

I'm new to Hive and am really enjoying the game. I knew that it hadn't been around long but looked up books for the heck of it. The bad news; there's only one (so far.) The good news; it's a really good book. The layout is fantastic, as well as the diagrams, the chapters and subchapters, the highlighted hints and strategies, and its length. The book is 200 pages, large pages, 8.5x11, there's a lot of info in there. Ingersoll's writing is thorough without being tedious. One look at the table of contents will show the amount of information within. And again, the diagrams are very clear and helpful but there's also a ton of them, I think it said 300. It's a quality book, I hope he writes more.

If you enjoy Hive and are looking to delve deeper this is an excellent resource. Also great as a beginner book. Very clearly written, fun to read, and well organized.

If you're already a game player, you won't need this review to tell you how good a game Hive is. This strategy guide will make you a much better player. You'll use this book.For those not familiar with Hive, it's a fast playing strategy game that plays in about 20 minutes. Very briefly, you each have a set of different bugs that each move in a unique way. The one who first surrounds their opponent's queen bee wins.The game is very much fun to play, and this book, which is the only strategy guide available for this game, will make you a very strong player.Buy the game. Buy this book. You won't be disappointed!

It is quite useful book for all the Hive game lovers. The game is beautifully designed, it is kind of modern chess, a bit simpler, yet the book shows that quite deep strategies are involved in this game too, full of illustrations, nice to read.

I haven't read much other than the first few pages - it looks like it is a very thorough and well written book.

I gave this book 4 of five stars though if the option was available I might have given it four and a half. It was VERY instructional and my have game has already improved. Some of the things lacking that I am very much hoping for in a sequel I will list, it is these things lacking that prevented the five.1. COLOR, is easier on my eyes, I own the color game not the "carbon" version. I get that color ink is more expensive and I would be willing to pay a few dollars more just for colored bugs.2. Like with chess, I would have liked annotated games with commentary. The examples from the book for strategy and tactics were from actual games but I mean an entire game from the first move on discussed in detail. Another inspired from chess aspect that was missing was puzzles, a made up board position with a challenge like "mate in 3" or what is the best move and why, or a position that looks lost but there is one move that can guarantee a draw etc.3. Some mention and discussion of the upcoming PILLBUG. I know that this book was written before the pillbug so its not fair really but I hope a follow up that includes much discussion of the pillbug is written. The pillbug will be a major game changer.