This is basically a game of Tic-Tac-Toe which you all might have played innumerable times. Here, we are playing with the black and white markers instead. Also, there is a bit change to the rules. The changed rules allows you to play just three times. After the three markers are put by each of the players, you can only slide your marker into an empty square that shares a common wall with the square that the marker is leaving.You can refer to the figure given. If this is the position of the game, the white's next move would be from 6 to 3. Now, whatever the black does, the white one will move his marker from 5 to 2 and he will have a three in a row.What you have to decide is if both of the players are using a perfect strategy, will the white player (who plays first) always win? Or it will be the black one who will win always? Or every game will be a draw?
Let us try and make the white win when black's first move is to a non-corner square. White begins at 5 and black places its first marker at 2. White puts at 9 and black puts at 1. White plays at 3. Now if black puts at 7 to block, white will move from 5 to 6 and will win. But in this game, black can only play his last marker at 6. White can't win on the next move as his market at square 9 won't be able to get to square 7 in a single move. But white cam get to square 7 before black can block him or win. White will move from 8 to 7 to win the game. Thus, white can always force a win if he starts from the center of the square.
