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Go is a two-player board game that was invented in China more than 2,500 years ago, was subsequently refined in Japan, and is believed to be the oldest board game continuously played to the present day.

The object of the game is to capture more territory on a board with a 19×19 grid of lines than one’s opponent by surrounding it with ‘stones’ – black or white depending on who is the stronger player. While the basic rules of the game are very simple, the possibilities are infinitely complex, as perhaps best evidenced by the fact that computers were able to beat the world’s top chess players twenty years before a computer – ‘AlphaGo’ – was developed that in 2016 managed for the first time to beat the world’s top Go player. Go has a significant advantage over chess for learners in that it has a very effective handicap system that allows beginners to play on equal terms with much stronger players.

Wikipedia gives a full, if indigestible, account of Go.

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