East the Beasts
Real rules, real strategy, and a free printable dot grid in three sizes, ready whenever you need a screen free game for the back of the car or a rainy afternoon. Pick a size below and print just that one grid, or read on for how the game actually works and how to stop losing it.
Rules
Dots and Boxes is played on a grid of dots. On your turn, draw one line connecting two dots that sit right next to each other, straight across or straight down, never diagonally. If that line completes the fourth and final side of a box, that box is yours, mark it with your initial and take another turn immediately. If it does not complete a box, play passes to the next player. Once every possible line on the grid has been drawn, count up the boxes, whoever has the most wins.
Strategy
As long as a safe move exists, one that does not leave any box with three sides drawn, take it. A box with three sides is a free gift to whoever moves next.
Toward the middle of the game, safe lines get scarce. Notice this coming, and start thinking about which group of boxes you will be forced to open, rather than being caught off guard.
Once no safe move is left, open the smallest connected group of boxes, a short chain, instead of a long one. Save the big prize for whoever plays the next part better, ideally you.
When you start taking a chain of three or more boxes, do not take every box in it. Stop two short, then decline both by drawing a line somewhere else instead of finishing them. Your opponent is forced to take those two, and then forced to open the next chain, handing control right back to you.
A loop, a closed ring of boxes rather than a straight line of them, behaves differently. Leave the last four boxes instead of two when you double-cross a loop, leaving only two still hands your opponent all four of them anyway.
Print a blank grid
Print prints only that one grid, not the whole page. Lines get drawn by hand once it is on paper, that is the whole game.
Want grids that are already drawn for you? Dots, Lines, and Boxes has 130 of them, ready to go, no printer needed.
See Dots, Lines, and BoxesQuestions
Small (3 by 3 boxes) is enough for a quick game or a younger player. Medium (5 by 5) is the length most people picture when they think of Dots and Boxes. Large (8 by 8) is for a longer game, or for more than two players taking turns.
Two is standard, but the rules work fine for three or more, everyone just keeps taking turns in order until every line on the grid is drawn.
No. Print a grid, grab a pencil, two different colors help if more than one person is playing, and that is the entire setup. No screen, no battery, no app.
Yes, identical rules. This page prints one grid at a time. Dots, Lines, and Boxes has 130 of them already drawn, so a long car trip does not run out partway through.