''U.S. Patent No. 1'' is a

board game Board games are tabletop games that typically use . These pieces are moved or placed on a pre-marked board (playing surface) and often include elements of table, card, role-playing, and miniatures games as well. Many board games feature a comp ...

James Ernest James Ernest is an American game designer and juggler, best known as the owner and lead designer of Cheapass Games. Career Prior to founding Cheapass Games, Ernest worked as a juggler at various venues, including Camlann Medieval Village, and a ...

, and published by

Cheapass Games Cheapass Games is a game company founded and run by game designer James Ernest, based in Seattle, Washington. Cheapass Games operates on the philosophy that most game owners have plenty of dice, counters, play money, and other common board game ...

2001 The September 11 attacks against the United States by Al-Qaeda, which Casualties of the September 11 attacks, killed 2,977 people and instigated the global war on terror, were a defining event of 2001. The United States led a Participants in ...

Gameplay

Each player's goal is to assemble a complete time machine (four components required), and travel back to the day the

U.S. Patent Office The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is an agency in the U.S. Department of Commerce that serves as the national patent office and trademark registration authority for the United States. The USPTO's headquarters are in Alexa ...

opened so as to secure the first patent issued for their efforts. The first actual U.S.

patent A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A p ...

was issued on July 31, 1790, to Samuel Hopkins for manufacture of

potash Potash () includes various mined and manufactured salts that contain potassium in water-soluble form.

. The game's cover art states that "But if you have a time machine, it doesn't really matter who invented it first. All that matters is who gets to the Patent Office first." However, prior to the 2011 America Invents Act, the United States was the sole country with a "first to invent" rule. Unfortunately, proving prior conception when time travel is involved may present difficulties to the inventor.

Reception

The game was nominated for the

Origins Award The Origins Awards are American awards for outstanding work in the game industry. They are presented by the Academy of Adventure Gaming Arts and Design at the Origins Game Fair on an annual basis for the previous year, so (for example) the 1979 aw ...

for ''Best Science Fiction or Fantasy Board Game of 2001'', but lost to Risk 2210.

Publication history

Cheapass Games no longer supports the game, but has made the complete game available for free download on their "Boulevard of Broken Games" page.

Reviews

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Pyramid A pyramid (from el, πυραμίς ') is a structure whose outer surfaces are triangular and converge to a single step at the top, making the shape roughly a pyramid in the geometric sense. The base of a pyramid can be trilateral, quadrilat ...

References

External links

U.S. Patent No. 1
at Cheapass Games
U.S. Patent No. 1
at

BoardGameGeek BoardGameGeek (BGG) is an online forum for board gaming hobbyists and a game database that holds reviews, images and videos for over 125,600 different tabletop games, including European-style board games, wargames, and card games. In addition to ...

Board games introduced in 2001 Cheapass Games games Board games with a modular board {{board-game-stub