Patent Application
20080164655
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a fortune telling game tower, and more particularly to a Ba-Gua (Eight-trigram) fortune telling game tower for self-divination and home entertainment.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Yi-Jing (The Book of Changes) and Ba-Gua (Eight-trigram) are both ancient Chinese heritage. Yi-Jing, Ba-Gua is related to two (Yi) divinations evolving to four (Xiang) divinations, four (Xiang) divinations to eight (Fang) divinations, eight (Fang) divinations to sixteen (Xing) divinations, sixteen (Xing) divinations to twenty-four (Jie) divinations, twenty-four (Jie) divinations to thirty-two (Qi) divinations, thirty-two (Qi
) divinations to forty (Wei) divinations, forty (Wei) divinations to forty-eight (Zhu) divinations, forty-eight (Zhu) divinations to fifty-six (Chi
) divinations and fifty-six (Chi
) divinations to sixty-four (Cheng) divinations. The mysterious principles of Yi-Jing and Ba-Gua tell the Yin-Yang (Moon & Sun) of the Chinese mythology and the eternal recycle of all forms. Yi-Jing and Ba-Gua is the most commonly used method in augury. However, the knowledge involved is so profound and so vast that no one is able to grasp the essence of it within a short period of time. There is no shortcut to learning to master and interpret symbols of Yi-Jing and Ba-Gua. An expert is needed when interpretation of divinatory symbols is required, which is quite troublesome and annoyed.
To overcome the shortcomings, the present invention tends to provide an improved Ba-Gua fortune telling game tower to mitigate the aforementioned problems.
The primary objective of the present invention is to provide a Ba-Gua fortune telling game tower to allow the player to easily grasp the meaning of the divinatory symbols shown from the tower of the present invention. The principle of the game tower is entirely based on forty-eight primary divinations of Yi-Jing Chi-Men (Mysterious Gate). That is, the divinations of the game tower of the present invention are composed of a main disk and multiple secondary disks. The main disk has eight primary divinatory sections, i.e. Qian, Dui, Li, Zhen, Kun, Gen, Kan and Xun and a ball rotatably received in the main disk and randomly rested in one of the eight divinatory sections. Each of the secondary disks is divided into multiple sections respectively designated with a numeral from 1-6. Therefore, the player is able to tell first from the divinatory sections of the main disk in which the ball rested in association with the numeral indicated by the secondary ball in one of the secondary disks of the result of the divination.
Because the process of the tower game is simple, everyone is eligible to play even though the player has no knowledge in ancient Chinese Ba-Gua and Yi-Jing.
Other objects, advantages and novel features of the invention will become more apparent from the following detailed description when taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.
With reference to
The main disk (10) includes a disk body (11) and a transparent main dome (12). The disk body (11) has a top face divided into eight divinatory sections (110) respectively provided with a Chinese character of Qian (), Dui (
), Li(
), Zhen(
), Kun(
), Gen (
), Kan(
) and Xun(
), an inner annular groove (111) defined in the top face and passing through the eight divinatory sections (110), an outer annular groove (112) defined in an outer periphery of the top face to sandwich the divinatory sections (110) with the inner annular groove (111) and a hollow cap (113) formed on a center of the top face. A bottom periphery of the transparent main dome (12) is received in the outer annular groove (112) to isolate the divinatory sections (110). A first ball (13) is able to roll on the inner annular groove (111) and is enclosed inside the transparent main dome (12). Therefore, after the transparent main dome (12) is on top of the top face of the disk body (11), the first ball (13) is able to move around each of the divinatory sections (110) along the annular inner groove (111) and rest on one of the divinatory sections (110).
In the preferred embodiment, there are three secondary disks, namely the first secondary disk (20), the second secondary disk (30) and the third secondary disk (40).
The first secondary disk (20) is composed of a first secondary disk body (21) and a transparent first secondary cover (22). The first secondary disk body (21) has a top face divided into twelve portions (210) respectively designated with a numeral from 1 to 6 (1-6) such that there are two sets of numerals of 1-6 on the top face of the first secondary disk body (21) to fill the twelve portions (210), a first inner annular groove (211) on the top face, a first outer annular groove (212) defined along an outer periphery of the top face of the first secondary disk body (21) and a mediate annular groove (213) defined in the top face and between the first outer annular groove (212) and the first inner annular groove (211). A first connection rod (215) is centrally formed on the top face of the first secondary disk body (21) to extend through a bottom face of the disk body (11) of the main disk (10) and into the hollow cap (113) to combine the first secondary disk (20) and the main disk (10). A second ball (23) is able to roll along the first inner annular groove (211) and rest on a corresponding one of the portions (210). The transparent first secondary cover (22) is composed of an outer wall (221) corresponding to the first outer annular groove (212), an inner wall (222) corresponding to the mediate annular groove (213) and an annular plate (223) interconnecting a top periphery of the outer wall (221) and the inner wall (222). Thus after the second ball (23) is placed on the first inner annular groove (211) of the first secondary disk (20) to allow the second ball (23) to move along the first inner annular groove (211), a bottom periphery of the outer wall (221) is able to be received in the first outer annular groove (212) and a bottom periphery of the inner wall (222) is able to be received in the mediate annular groove (213) to entirely prevent interference from outside the first secondary disk (20) to the second ball (23).
The second secondary disk (30) and the third secondary disk (40) respectively have a second secondary disk body (31), a third secondary disk body (41), a transparent second secondary cover (32), a transparent third secondary cover (42), a third ball (33), able to roll on a second inner annular groove (311) on the second secondary disk body (31) and a fourth ball (43) able to roll on a third inner annular groove (411) on the third secondary disk body (41). The second secondary disk body (31) has a top face divided into eighteen portions (310) and the third secondary disk body (41) has a top face divided into twenty-four portions (410). When compared with the structure with the first secondary disk (20), it is noted that the second secondary disk (30) and the third secondary disk (40) each has a structure the same as that of the first secondary disk (20). Thus further details of the structure of the second secondary disk (30) and the third secondary disk (40) are omitted. However, the function and the structure of the second secondary disk (30) and the third secondary disk (40) maybe understood by reference to the structure and function of the first secondary disk (20). According to the eighteen portions (310) on the top face of the second secondary disk (30) and twenty-four portions (410) on the top face of the third secondary disk (40), there are three sets of numerals from 1 to 6 on the second secondary disk (30) and there are four sets of numerals from 1 to 6 on the top face of the third secondary disk (40).
A third ball (33) and a fourth ball (43) are respectively able to roll on the third inner annular groove (311) and on the fourth inner annular groove (411). It is noted that the first secondary disk body (21) has twelve portions (210), the second secondary disk body (31) has eighteen portions (310) and the third secondary disk body (41) has twenty-four portions (410). Accordingly, the first secondary disk (20) (with twelve portions) is able to divine wedding, love affairs, friendship, . . . etc., the second secondary disk (30) (with eighteen portions) is able to divine healthy, travelling . . . etc., and the third secondary disk (40) (with twenty four portions) is able to divine fortune and business.
When the game tower of the present invention is played, the player(s) shakes the entire game tower to allow the balls (13,23,33,43) to roll along the inner annular groove (111,211,411,411). After the balls (13,23,33,43) are stopped on the top faces of the disk bodies (11,21,31,41), the player may observe the position of the ball (13) to determine which divinatory section (110) he/she should look up in a reference book (90), as shown in
With reference to
Suppose a player is playing the game tower and the player wishes to know his/her fate in the business, the first ball (13) stops at the Qian () section (110) and the fourth ball (43) stops at numeral one (1), the player looks up the reference book (90) for the divination interpretation. If the player is a female player, she gets an index of six supposing business is her wish to know during the divination, whereas the result is “should not be proud of”. If the player is a male player, he gets an index of seven supposing business is his wish to know during the divination, whereas the result is “should not be carried away”.
In the depiction of
It is to be understood, however, that even though numerous characteristics and advantages of the present invention have been set forth in the foregoing description, together with details of the structure and function of the invention, the disclosure is illustrative only, and changes may be made in detail, especially in matters of shape, size, and arrangement of parts within the principles of the invention to the full extent indicated by the broad general meaning of the terms in which the appended claims are expressed.
