Blokus Duo (also known as Blokus Travel) is a two-player abstract strategy game where each player tries to place as many of their 21 polyomino pieces on a 14x14 board as possible. Each new piece must touch at least one of your existing pieces, but only at the corners – never along a side. The player who places the most squares on the board wins.
Components
1 game board (14x14 grid)
84 pieces in 4 colors (21 pieces per color: red, blue, yellow, green)
1 one-square piece (monomino)
1 two-square piece (domino)
2 three-square pieces (triominoes)
5 four-square pieces (tetrominoes)
12 five-square pieces (pentominoes)
Setup
Each player chooses a color and takes that set of 21 pieces.
In the two-player version, one player controls blue and red, the other controls yellow and green.
The playing order is: blue, yellow, red, green.
Choose a player to go first.
Turn Structure
Players alternate turns, placing one piece at a time following this order: blue, yellow, red, green.
Actions
Place a Piece
The first piece played by each color must cover a corner square of the board.
Each subsequent piece must touch at least one other piece of the same color, but only at the corners.
Pieces of the same color can never touch along a side (edge-to-edge).
There are no restrictions on how pieces of different colors may contact each other.
Once a piece has been placed on the board, it cannot be moved.
Pass
If a player is unable to place any of their remaining pieces, they must pass their turn.
Scoring / Victory Conditions
Basic Scoring
When neither player can place any more pieces, the game ends.
Each player counts the number of squares in their remaining (unplaced) pieces across both their colors.
The player with the lowest number of remaining squares wins.
Advanced Scoring
Each remaining square = -1 point
If all pieces of a color are placed: +15 points
If the last piece placed was the one-square piece (monomino): +5 additional bonus points
Maximum possible score per color: +20 points (all pieces placed, monomino last)
The player with the highest score wins.
Special Rules & Edge Cases
In the two-player version, each player controls two colors and calculates their final score by combining both colors.
Pieces of different colors may touch along sides – only same-color side-touching is forbidden.
Corner-touching is mandatory for same-color pieces – you cannot place a piece that only touches same-color pieces along a side.
The board is 14x14 (196 squares total), which is smaller than standard 4-player Blokus (20x20).
Three-Player Variant
Each player chooses one color.
The remaining color is shared and played alternately by each player.
The shared color’s score is ignored in final scoring.