The board is also made up of a number of hexagons, with the two outermost rings reserved for three- and four-player games respectively.

Players take turns placing a tile on the board, scoring points by creating lines of identically colored hexes.

If a player reaches a score of 18 with any colour, they declare 'Ingenious', 'Genial' or 'Mensa' (depending on which language version they are playing) and place a further tile.

Otherwise, the game ends when no more pieces can be added to the board, at which time players check the colour in which they have the fewest points.

The unusual victory condition ('highest lowest score wins') requires players to develop all six colours and drives a higher degree of strategic planning than would otherwise be the case.

Tactical considerations include not only how many points a player will earn by placing a particular tile, but also which colours they will score on, often resulting in a trade-off between the two.

At the end of each game, the levels of the colours with the fewest points and their differences are reported.

During his time the player declares aloud his score and moves the cubes (the opponent has to check in this very moment).

If at the end of the tournament 2 or more players have the same number of VPs, the following criteria are used in order as tie-breakers: Einfach Genial - Reiseedition, produced by Kosmos (US version: Ingenious Travel Edition released by Fantasy Flight Games) is a travel version of the game, for two players only.

This is much smaller than the regular version, and the plastic board incorporates indentations to hold the players' tiles as well as holes for the scoring pegs.

Einfach Genial Knobelspass (Simply Ingenious Puzzles), also from Kosmos, uses cardboard versions of the tiles from the original game.

The player has one of each of the 21 different tile combinations and for each puzzle must place these in the correct positions on a pre-printed sheet to match the coloured symbols.

It uses similar techniques of matching coloured symbols but utilises a square board instead of hexagons.