Halma

About the game

Halma is one of the oldest modern board games, and this is a simple version of it. Your pieces start packed in a triangle at the bottom of a star-shaped board; the computer's pieces sit at the top. The goal is to carry every one of your pieces across the middle and into the opposite corner. Nothing is captured and nothing is removed: the whole game is about getting across faster than the other side, without getting in your own way.

A piece can move in two ways. It can step into any empty hole next to it, or it can hop over a neighbouring piece, yours or an opponent's, and land in the empty hole just behind it. The fun is in the hops, because they can be chained: after one jump the same piece may jump again, and a well-prepared line of pieces lets a single piece cross half the board in one move. When you click a piece the game lights up every hole it can reach with such chains, so you only have to pick where it should go.

Before a game you choose the board (the six-pointed star or a square board), how many computer players there are and how many people. You play red, and the computer players move first. The computer is simple, so it is a relaxed game to learn the idea of building ladders for your pieces.

Playing it here

Click Play on the page and wait a moment while the game loads; the first screen is the main menu. Choose New Game, pick the board and press Start Game. The Help button shows a short summary of the rules. The game is in English only and makes no request to any other site. The difficulty setting of the original app did not change anything, so it is not offered here.

Controls

Tips

Build a ladder. Leave pieces spaced one hole apart along your route: each one is a stepping stone that lets another piece hop two holes at a time.

Do not leave stragglers. The last piece in your home corner is the hardest to bring across, so move your rear pieces early.

Watch the hole behind the enemy. The same ladders help the computer; if one of its hops depends on a piece of yours, think about moving it.

FAQ

Can two people play on the same screen? The game has a People counter, but the win check was made for a single human player (red), so it is best played against the computer.

Does it save my game? No, a game lasts a few minutes and starts again from the menu.

Is there sound? No, the game has no sound.

Credits and licence

Halma was made by Marvin (Crazy-Marvin) and Martin (mmelnizky) and is free software under the Apache License 2.0. This is a modified browser edition: it removes the error-reporting service and the links to other sites, replaces the help text and the winner screen (they were in German) and replaces three bitmap fonts with Arimo, EB Garamond and Arvo Bold (SIL Open Font License 1.1). The interface graphics come from the "Flat Earth UI" skin by Raymond "Raeleus" Buckley, licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0. The game uses libGDX and GWT (Apache License 2.0) and TenPatch (MIT). The licences and the recipe of this build are linked from this page.