This is a nifty game with lots of elements that hint at other games.

First, the board is constructed from 9 tiles that have 3x3 spaces on them. Tile placement, like Carcassonne, or The Legend of Landlock!!! But it is NOTHING like Carcassonne or Landlock.

Second, you have 9 figures with numbers on their backs, which the opponent cannot see. Secret values like Stratego!!! But it is NOTHING like Stratego.

Third, your pieces hop sort of diagonally across the board, mainly trying to get to the other side. Hopping pieces to the other side, like Checkers!!! But it is NOTHING like Checkers.

Fourth, the pieces have different abilities to move, and when you land on a space with another player in it, you capture that piece. Different pieces with different movement and capturing pieces, like Chess!!! But it is NOTHING like Chess.

Here's how it goes: Each player is trying to get a team of grasshoppers, numbered 1 through 9 (those numbers remain secret to each opponent), from one side of the 'pond' to the other. There are spaces of just water, spaces of leaves, and spaces of flowers. From a water space, a piece may move one space towards the opposite end's goal. From a leaf, 2 spaces, and from a flower, 3 spaces. You can only move forward. UNLESS, a backwards move allows you to capture an opponent - only then can you move backward.

Once one player cannot move, whether it is because that player has no pieces left, or all pieces have made it far enough across the board that there are no more legal moves, the game ends instantly.

Here's how it is scored... add up the value of each grasshopper that made it to the opponent's starting space. Add to that one point for each captured grasshopper.

There is a lot of wicked strategy here, and you have to really pay attention to what can get to your pieces. You have to try to protect your high valued pieces, sometimes sacrificing the lower valued ones to do it. The game may end before you'd like, if the other player manages to fly across the board quickly, leaving your high-valued pieces unscored.

One major complaint: Like many games, the pieces are not labeled with the numbers when you first open it. It comes with stickers that go on the back of the pieces that you have to put on. The stickers are just awful. They do not stay on well at all... I have to think of something else to do... maybe superglue them on. Or possibly etch the numbers into that back with a pocket knife. Something. It took us ten minutes before the game to find the number 3 sticker for the white pieces! That's unacceptable. The rules suggest that the stickers can be shifted around between games, in case someone begins to recognize a feature of one of the grasshoppers. I think they are just cheap stickers.

OK, that's really a MINOR complaint. The game is fun, clever, and tactical. And quite reasonably priced for a game made from sturdy cardboard pieces of the game field, with real wooden playing pieces.