• Red moves first. Pieces move one square diagonally forward, on the dark squares only.
• Taking is compulsory: jump an enemy piece next to you onto the empty square beyond, and keep jumping with the same piece while you can. With more than one way to take, choose any, but finish it.
• A man reaching the far row becomes a king (it ends the move) and may then move and jump backward too.
• You lose when you can't move: every piece taken, or all of them blocked. The same position three times, or forty moves each with no capture and no man moving, is a draw.

These are the American and English rules (checkers, or draughts). Elsewhere the game is often played with kings that fly along the diagonals; not here.