The simplest card game there is: turn over your top card, and the higher card wins both. Equal cards mean war. Americans know it as War.
Battle is played by two players with one 52-card deck. The deck is shuffled and split evenly, so each player has a face-down pile of 26 cards.
In each battle, both players turn their top card face up. The higher card wins, and the winner puts both cards at the bottom of their pile. Aces are high, and suits don't matter.
If the two cards are the same rank, there is a war. Each player puts their next card face down and then another card face up. The higher of the new face-up cards takes every card on the table. If those tie too, the war goes on the same way.
If a player runs short during a war, they play their last card as the face-up card. A player with no cards left for a war loses.
Battle is the British name for the game known in America as War. It is one of the oldest and simplest children's card games, and it's played with the ordinary deck.
German versions of the game were mentioned as early as 1833, under names such as Bettelmann ("Beggar Man") and Tod und Leben ("Life and Death").
Because players make no choices and every result depends on the shuffle, some people say it isn't a game at all under a strict definition. A game can in theory go on for ever, so many families agree on a time limit, as we do here.
Battle is a free browser version of the classic card game, with a daily deck, auto-play and online leaderboards. There's nothing to download and no sign-up.