The rules to Al-Jabar are freely available and anyone is welcome to make and play (but not sell) their own copies. Other than the rules, the only components needed are appropriately colored pieces and some means of randomly drawing them.
Here are some suggested components:
- Colored pieces of paper
- Marbles
- Colored Paperclips
- Beads
- Small glass gems
- Poker chips
- Colored pawns
- Tiddledy-winks
Al-Jabar can also be played with two decks of playing cards, where one deck is marked on the faces. Each card can then be identified by color, high suit or low suit (spades and hearts/diamonds and clubs), and original deck. This produces eight “colors:”
- Red, high, deck A (heart from deck A) = white
- Red, high, deck B (heart from deck B) = orange
- Red, low, deck A (diamond from deck A) = purple
- Red, low, deck B (diamond from deck B) = red
- Black, high, deck A (spade from deck A) = green
- Black, high, deck B (spade from deck B) = yellow
- Black, low, deck A (club from deck A) = blue
- Black, low, deck B (club from deck B) = clear
Then the three characteristics, instead of the primary colors as in the original game, are color, high or low suit, and deck.
We would love to see your own set! Email us a picture and we may post it here. We can be reached on the Contact page or at info@al-jabargames dot com.