Fanorona

Fanorona is a very cool game that comes all the way from Madagascar! It's kind of like checkers, but it's a little more complicated.

In Fanorona, two people play against each other on a special board that has an equal number of black and white squares. Each player has little round pieces that they move around the board, trying to capture their opponent's pieces.

The way that you capture your opponent's pieces is by "jumping" over them. Imagine you have a little round piece in one square, and your opponent has a piece in the square next to it. If you can move your piece to a square on the other side of your opponent's piece (in a straight line, not diagonally), you can "jump" over their piece and capture it.

But there's a twist! You can only capture pieces if you're moving in a certain way. If you just go one square at a time, you can't capture anything. But if you can use your piece to make your opponent's piece "stuck" in between two of your pieces (either horizontally, vertically, or diagonally), you can capture it too!

The players take turns moving their pieces, trying to capture as many of their opponent's pieces as possible while keeping their own safe. The game ends when one player can't make a legal move anymore (meaning they're all stuck and can't capture anything).

It might sound confusing, but it's really fun once you start playing! So if you ever get the chance to try Fanorona, go for it!