Multimatch I 1966

The equipment for Multimatch I is a set of MacMahon's Three-Color Squares. This contains 24 squares representing all ways to divide a square into four equal triangles (with short edges along the square's diagonals) and color the triangles with 3 colors.

Wade E. Philpott sold a cardboard set of squares, including rules for several games and puzzles, beginning in 1966. Kadon distributed it beginning in 1982 and started producing an acrylic version in 1989.

The second edition Kadon rulebook (dated 1991) contains rules for 4 games, plus variants. The first three were originally designed by Philpott, although they have been changed slightly over the years; Closure was not in the original set and was presumably designed by Kate Jones.

The games are:

Multimatch. Players take turns placing tiles on the 5x5 gameboard. Edges must match and the first piece placed on a border of the board determines the color of that border. Last player wins.

Bingo. Players take turns placing tiles on the 5x5 grid, attempting to be the first to create a row of 5.

Outmatched. Players divide the tiles equally (face-down) and then race to assemble their group into a rectangle, with tile edges matching.

Closure. The tiles are assembled into a random (but edge-matching) group. Players take turns "closing" one of the 3 colors by moving as few tiles as possible. Closing a color requires leaving no exposed edges of that color. Moves may not separate any tiles from the group.