2026-09-21 · history
Othello (1973) — The Year a Game Whose Patent Was Rejected Was Proven, Half a Century Later, to End in a Draw
Othello: black and white discs on a green board, flipped by sandwiching the opponent's line. Goro Hasegawa of Japan sold it through Tsukuda in 1973. But the game had a 19th-century English forebear called Reversi, and the historical record includes two Englishmen publicly accusing each other of plagiarizing it. Hasegawa's own origin story changed too — the version he told at launch differs from the one he told from the 2000s onward. His attempt to register the rules (a Japanese utility model) was ultimately rejected, so no one has ever owned Othello's rules as it spread worldwide. In 1997, a computer named Logistello swept the reigning world champion six games to none. In 2023, mathematicians proved that perfect play by both sides ends in a draw. This piece follows the nearly 150-year lineage of a single flipping disc.
