tick-tack-toe

tick·tack·toe also tick-tack-toe or tic-tac-toe  (tktkt)

n.

A game played by two people, each trying to make a line of three X's or three O's in a boxlike figure with nine spaces.

---

[Probably imitative of the sounds of the original children's game, in which players brought pencils down on a numbered slate with their eyes shut.]

---

tick-tack-toe [ˌtɪktækˈtəʊ], tick-tack-too [ˌtɪktækˈtuː]

n

(Group Games / Games, other than specified) the usual US and Canadian term for noughts and crosses

[from ticktack (meaning: an obsolete variety of backgammon)]

Thesaurus

Noun

1.

tick-tack-toe - a game in which two players alternately put crosses and circles in one of the compartments of a square grid of nine spaces; the object is to get a row of three crosses or three circles before the opponent does noughts and crosses, tic-tac-toe, ticktacktoe, ticktacktoo, tit-tat-toe board game - a game played on a specially designed board