China Moon

About this board game

China Moon is a frog-racing game for 2–5 players that takes about 30 minutes to play. In a moonlit Chinese pond, teams of three frogs compete to gather the most beautiful bouquet of lotus blossoms.

The story begins with a sad mandarin duck who wants to find a special gift for his sweetheart. When the full moon rises, the frogs sharing his pond decide to help by collecting rare and beautiful water lily blossoms for him.

Players lead their teams in a frantic leap-frog race from lily pad to lily pad. The aim is to assemble the most beautiful lotus blossom bouquet, but the path to victory has an unusual twist: you help your opponents’ frogs, and they cannot help but do the same for you.

• Players: 2–5
• Playing time: approximately 30 minutes
• Theme: frogs, lily pads, lotus blossoms, and a moonlit pond
• Objective: gather the most beautiful bouquet

This playful race captures the loony charm of frogs hopping across a pond while turning cooperation between opponents into part of the contest. Every team is working toward its own bouquet, yet progress is tied to the actions of the other frogs on the pond.

Originally published in 1996 as Flower of the Lotus at The Game Cabinet website, the game appeared at Essen 2003 under the titles China Moon and Lotusblume, published by Eurogames / Descartes Deutschland. China Moon was later republished in 2008 in Klutz’s book The 15 Greatest Board Games in the World.