Achi (game)

Achi is a two-player abstract strategy game from Ghana, belonging to the alignment family of games in which each side tries to line up three of its pieces. It is played on a small three-by-three board of lines, with two diagonals joining opposite corners. Players take turns placing counters on the points where lines meet, and once every counter is down they slide pieces along a line to an adjacent empty point, each trying to make a row of three horizontally, vertically or diagonally. In the version usually described each player has four pieces, and a player who cannot move loses. A second version gives each side only three pieces, which makes the game identical to three men's morris, and the game is also called tapatan. It needs only a board drawn on the ground or on paper and two kinds of distinguishable objects as pieces, so it is easy to play almost anywhere.