Crown Jump Checkers

What is Crown Jump Checkers?

Crown Jump Checkers is full-rules American checkers (also called English draughts) against computer opponents with faces, voices and their own playing styles. The World Tour takes you through six places: The Porch at Mapleview, the Lazy Heron Riverboat, Sandpiper Boardwalk, Pinecrest Mountain Lodge, the Willowbend Lantern Festival and The Grand Hall of Crowns. Beat a rival and the next one opens up.

The early rivals leave pieces hanging and walk into jumps, so a first game is very winnable. By the Lantern Festival they see several moves ahead, and the last opponent, The Grand Duke, searches deep for over four seconds a move and almost never makes a mistake. The game is free, runs in your browser on a phone, tablet or computer, and there's nothing to download.

Outside the Tour you'll find Quick Play at ten strengths, Two Players on one device, 180 puzzles in six packs and the Daily Puzzles, three shots that are the same for everyone each day.

Checkers rules in plain words

Checkers is played on the 64-square board used for chess, but only the dark squares matter. Each side starts with 12 pieces, called men, on the dark squares of the three rows nearest to them. The board sits so each player has a dark square in the bottom left corner. In our game Red moves first, then you take turns, one move each.

Moving

A man moves one square diagonally forward onto an empty dark square. Men never move backward unless they're jumping as a king.

Jumping

If an enemy piece is diagonally next to one of your men and the square right behind it is empty, you can jump over it and take it off the board. If the piece that just jumped can jump again from its new square, it keeps going in the same move. That's a double jump, a triple jump, and so on. Men only jump forward.

• Jumps are a must. If any jump is available, you have to take one. You can't make a quiet move instead.
• You pick the jump. If several jumps are possible, you may choose any of them. You don't have to take the one that captures the most.
• Finish the chain. Once you start a multi-jump, you must keep jumping with that piece until no more jumps are possible.

Kings

A man that reaches the far row is crowned and becomes a king. Crowning ends the move, even if the new king could jump again right away. A king moves and jumps one square at a time like a man, but in all four diagonal directions, forward and backward.

Winning and draws

You win by taking all of the other side's pieces or by leaving them with no legal move. A player who is completely blocked loses. The game is a draw if the same position comes up three times, or if both sides play 40 moves each with no capture and no man moved (only kings shuffling around). In games against the computer you can also offer a draw from the game menu, and your rival accepts if the position really is level.

Rule options: Casual and Flying kings

Quick Play and Two Players let you change the rules. The Tour and the puzzles always use standard rules.

• Casual: jumping is optional. If you skip a jump, a friendly note tells you that you could have jumped.
• Flying kings: an international-style game on the 8 by 8 board. Kings glide any distance along a diagonal and can jump a piece from far away, landing on any empty square past it. Men can capture backward (they still only move forward). You must take the sequence that captures the most pieces. A man that passes through the far row in the middle of a jump stays a man and is crowned only if its move ends there. Jumped pieces stay on the board until the move is over, so you can't jump the same piece twice.

How to play on phone and computer

Tap one of your pieces and dots show where it can go. Tap a dot to move. You can also drag a piece to its square. When a jump is forced, the pieces that can jump glow orange. Pick one and the pieces it will take get a red ring. For a multi-jump, tap each landing square in turn, or tap the final square to do the whole chain at once.

On a computer you can use the mouse the same way. Keyboard players can click the board, then move a cursor with the arrow keys and press Enter or Space to pick a piece and a square. Esc drops the piece, U undoes and H asks for a hint.

Undo and hints are always free. The hint shows a suggested move with a green arrow. Settings let you turn off the move dots, turn on the standard 1 to 32 square numbers, speed up the animations and add soft music.

The World Tour and crowns

Each of the 20 rivals has three crowns to win, 60 in all:

• Win the game.
• Win with no undo and no hints.
• Win with 5 or more of your pieces still on the board.

You can collect the crowns in different games, so it's fine to win once with help and come back later for a clean win. Each rival has a style you'll learn to read: traders swap pieces and push forward, careful defenders sit on their back row and wait for your mistake, king hunters race for the crown row, and shot makers set traps that end in multi-jumps. Your crown total earns titles from Porch Rookie up to Grand Champion, and it's also your score on the Tour leaderboard.

Puzzles and the Daily Puzzles

Every puzzle is a position from a real game where Red has a winning shot. Sometimes it's a straight multi-jump. More often it's a quiet move or a sacrifice that forces the other side to jump into a bigger jump of your own. When you find the right move, the other side answers and you keep going until the combination is done.

There are 180 puzzles in six packs, from Porch Puzzlers to Grand Combos. Solve 15 in a pack to open the next one. You earn 3 stars for a clean solve, 2 stars with one miss or one hint, and 1 star after that. After two misses you can ask the game to play the answer for you.

The Daily Puzzles are three shots that get harder through the set, the same for every player that day. A clean solve is worth 400 points, one slip 250, more than that 150, plus up to 100 bonus points for speed. A puzzle you let the game answer scores nothing. Your total goes on the daily leaderboard and playing on back-to-back days builds a streak.

Unlocks, awards and daily goals

Crowns, puzzle stars, wins and daily goals unlock five piece sets (Classic, Marble, Candy, Jade and Gold), eight boards from Maple Porch to Ice Palace, and five crown styles. Reaching a new venue on the Tour also unlocks its board. Three daily goals, such as Crown 2 kings or Make a double jump, refresh every day, and there are 21 awards to collect, including a few that take some doing, like beating the Grand Duke or having five kings at once.

Tips and strategy

• Keep pieces in pairs. A man with a friend right behind it can't be jumped from the front, because there's no empty landing square. Loose single men out in front are what the computer feeds on.
• Guard your back row. As long as you keep men on your own back row, the other side can't crown. If you can only keep two, the classic pair for Red is squares 1 and 3, known as the bridge (turn on Square numbers to see them).
• Use the forced jump against them. Because jumping is a must, you can give away one piece on purpose to pull an enemy man onto a square where you then jump two or three.
• Check what your move allows. Most lost pieces come from moving a man so that it leaves an empty square behind it. Look at the square you're leaving, not only the one you're going to.
• Hold the center. Men in the middle of the board have two ways forward and support each other. Men on the side edges are safe from jumps but only have one move.
• Trade when you're ahead. Every even trade makes a lead bigger in proportion. Four pieces against three is a small edge, but two against one is a win.
• Two kings beat one, but know the double corner. The two-square corners (squares 1 and 5, and 28 and 32) are where a lone king hides, because it can shuttle back and forth there. To win, bring both kings close, take the shuttle squares away and force it out. If you're the one behind, head for a double corner and the 40-move draw may save you.

Questions