Pentana

Pentana is a 1978 game by Larry Yoos, published at Pentana Enterprises.

The game is a moku variant played on a 4x4 board, with four pieces per player.

Rules:

• Initially, the pieces are placed on each player's first row
• On his turn, the player moves a friendly piece to any adjacent empty square (orthogonally or diagonally)
• Wins the player that makes a 4 in-a-row with his pieces (except at the row where his pieces begin) or by placing the pieces in the four board corners.
  

The game seems too simplistic to work properly. If a player places three pieces in a main diagonal (excluding the adversary row), the adversary only has one way to win, which is to make one column, and that column can easily be blocked by the player's fourth piece.

Not sure why the name has the root 'penta' in it, since that means five. Perhaps it as something to do with the success of Pente (published at 1977).

A game ad at Games #24: