Arimaa Fan Site

Arimaa, pronounced "a-ree-muh", is a game where stronger animals like elephants and camels freeze, push, and pull the weaker ones from the opposing team around and into traps, while one of the rabbits tries to sneak across the board and harmlessly reach the other side.

The first player to get one of their rabbits to the other side wins.

This may sound like a simple kids' game, and while it is easy enough for your kids to learn and enjoy, you will find that it is also a very deep game that can take a lifetime to master.

Arimaa is one of the deepest strategy games ever invented in the history of mankind, but designed to look intuitively simple. No two games of Arimaa are ever the same. There is much to learn and discover about this intuitively simple, yet intellectually challenging, game.

Played on an 8x8 grid with four trap squares and 32 animal pieces (16 gold and 16 silver). Each player has an elephant, a camel, 2 horses, 2 dogs, 2 cats, and 8 rabbits.

Strength hierarchy: Elephant > Camel > Horse > Dog > Cat > Rabbit.

The game begins with an empty board. Gold places the sixteen gold pieces first in any configuration on the first and second ranks.

Silver then places the sixteen silver pieces in any configuration on seventh and eighth ranks. Then gold moves its pieces first. A player can move up to four "steps" each turn. All pieces move orthogonally.