User Guide

Blindfold Checkers is a fully accessible puzzle, for both sighted and visually impaired people, designed for rapid audio play.
Checkers, also known as draughts, is a fun and easy game that dates back to the 12th century.  Each player begins the game with 12 pieces, or checkers, placed in the three rows closest to him or her.  The objective of the game is to eliminate all of your opponent’s checkers by jumping over them.  Read the tutorial for more details.
To move around the board, flick your finger left, right, up or down.
To hear the location of the square you are in, press one finger for about a second.
To select one of your checkers to move, tap the screen with 2 fingers, and then flick to the target square, and tap the screen with 2 fingers again.
You will hear a drum sound when your checker has been selected.
To cancel the selected checker, just tap that same square again with 2 fingers. You’ll hear a honk, and you can select a different checker.
If you attempt a move that’s not allowed, you’ll hear a honk.
For example, since a jump must be made if one is available, and you attempt to make a move other than the jump, you’ll hear a honk.

Moving around on the board

Normally, you move around the board by flicking your finger vertically or horizontally.
You can also move diagonally by enabling the DIAGONAL MOVEMENT setting, and you can it have say the new cursor position at the same time.
To move diagonally amongst the squares, swipe to the upper left, upper right, lower left or lower right.

Gestures

To take back a move, swipe left with 3 fingers.
To hear how many checkers you and your opponent have, swipe down with 3 fingers.
To hear where all the checkers are, swipe up with 2 fingers. This only works when there are 4 or fewer red or black checkers.
To cancel your move after you selected a checker, swipe right with 3 fingers.

Playing against the computer

When playing against the computer, you can change the name and skill of the other player.
This game uses a deep-search algorithm for finding the best move, and the more moves (and counter moves) evaluated by your oppoent, the better his move will be.
Players are chosen randomly; some are great, some are good, some are poor players.
To find out more about each of the computer players, in the SETTINGS screen, tap CUSTOMIZE COMPETITOR.
To change a competitor’s name, or their skill level, or their personality, tap on the INFO button.
Customizing your competitors requires an in-app upgrade.

Hints

In the SETTINGS screen, to hear a zip-pop-bop sound when a move is valid, turn on that setting.
That setting will also turn on the danger sound. After each time your opponent moves, or when you are moving or jumping, you will hear a clicks if the move will leave your checker vulnerable.
Three clicks means the checker is vulnerable from one of your opponent’s checkers or kings, 5 clicks means it is vulnerable from at least 2 checkers or kings.

How to use coins

To play one level of Checkers you will use one coin. Each time you move up a level, you use another coin.
This game comes with 7 coins.
You can buy more coins at any time; tap the GET UPGRADES button on the main screen.
Refer to the Common Features Guide for details.

Settings

The SETTINGS screen has several sections.
In the first section of SETTINGS, you can change how the game performs.
You can turn off the background music.
You can change how loud the kettle drum swap sound is.
You can switch between canceling your move on a illegal move (such as moving on top of your opponents checker), or to simply reporting the problem, but let you continue to move your selected checker somewhere else. In either case, it’s still your turn.
Refer to the Common Features Guide for more information.

Tutorial

Checkers is played on a standard 64 square board.
Only the 32 white colored squares are used in play.
Each player begins the game with 12 pieces, or checkers, placed in the three rows closest to him or her.
Looking at the bottom three rows, where the letter B means a black colored square that is never used, and R is your red checker, the rows are:
R B R B R B R B
B R B R B R B R
R B R B R B R B
Basic movement is to move a checker one space diagonally forward.
You can not move a checker backwards until it becomes a King, as described below.
Consider the following three rows, where W1 and W2 means white empty squares, B neabs a black unused square and R1, R2 and R3 are three of your red checkers.
R3 B W2
B W1 B
R1 B R2
You can move either R1 to the W1 square or R2 to the W1 square, but you cannot move R3 backwards to the W1 square.
In this configuration, there is no red checker that can move the the W2 square.
If one of your opponent’s checkers is on a forward diagonal next to one of your checkers, and the next space beyond the opponent’s checker is empty, then your checker can jump the opponent’s checker and land in the space beyond.
Your opponent’s checker is captured and removed from the board.
Your checker must jump when possible.
For example, consider the a section of the board as follows where G1 is your opponents green checker, and R1 and R2 are you red checkers.
W1 B W2
B G1 B
R1 B R2
Assuming its your turn, R2 can jump over G1 and land in W1, and elminate G1 from the board.
Alternatively, R1 can jump over G1 and land in W2, and eliminate G1 from the board.
When you checker makes it all the way to the opposite site of the board, it is crowned and becomes a King. Your turn ends there.
A King can move backward as well as forward along the diagonals. It can only move a distance of one space.
Remember, when the game starts, your checkers are on rows 6, 7 and 8, and each checker must make it to row 1 to be crowned.
A King can also jump backward and forward. In each jump, the King can only jump over one opposing piece at a time, and it must land in the space just beyond the captured piece.
The King can not move multiple spaces before or after jumping a piece.
Your King must jump when possible.
The game is over when either your or your opponent have no more pieces left on the board, and the winning player is the one with pieces still on the board.
Or, if one player has no more moves, that player loses.

A Typical Game

Here’s how a typical game goes. You start by moving your cursor from column 1 row 8 to column 1 row 6, and then tap with 2 fingers, to select that checker, and you will hear the kettle bell.
Move your cursor to column 2, row 5, and you will hear the zip-bop-pop. Tap with 2 fingers again to complete the move.
The computer opponent usually moves from column 4, row 3 to column 3, row 4.
Since your checker is next to the computer’s checker, and it can jump over your checker, you will hear the 3 clicks indicating your checker is vulnerable to being captured.
Fortunately, you can take the computer’s checker first.
Tap with 2 fingers to select your checker at column 2, row 5, and move your cursor to column 5, row 3, and tap with 2 fingers to complete the move.
You jumped over the computer’s checker, and removed the computer’s checker at column 3, row 4.
After you made that move, your checker is vulnerable to being captured by the computer’s checker at column 5, row 2.
Unfortunately, there’s nothing you can do to prevent that, and if there’s a jump available, that jump must be made.
Now the computer goes, and it jumps from column 5, row 2 to column 3, row 4, and removes your checker at column 4, row 3.