Rules for Karl's Chess Variants -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Angle Chess White: K d1, Q e1, B c1 f1, N b1 g1, R h1, P c2 d2 e2 f2 g2 h2; Black K a4, Q a5, B a3 a6, N a2 a7, R a8, P b3 b4 b5 b6 b7 b8. Black pawns move to the right, all chess rules apply correspondingly. Variant: A white Rook on b1 and a black Rook on a2 replace the Knights on these positions. Bank Chess At a cost of a turn, you may move any of your pieces - except the king - off the board (put it in your "bank account").. At a cost of a turn, you may re-insert a piece from your bank account to an empty place on the board any time later. Pawns can only be re-inserted from rank two to rank seven. Apart from this, the standard chess rules apply. Bank Chess - Half-Standard Every second move must be a standard chess move. Depending with what you decide to start, there are two variants. Bank Chess - Swap variant Only one piece is allowed to be in your bank account at any time. If you put another one out, you forfeit the piece in your account.. Bank Chess - Half-Standard Swap As Swap Variant, but very second move must be a standard chess move. Depending with what you decide to start, there are two variants. Better Pawns Variant 1: Allow that pawns move sideways. Capturing is still only diagonally forward. Variant 2: Allow that pawns move sideways and backwards. Capturing is still only forward. Variant 3: Additionally to promotion on the far rank, allow that (a-,b-,c-,d-) pawns promote at h-file, pawns from the right half of the board promote at the left side (a-file). This makes only sense if we allow sideways movement as well. Variant 4: As in variant 3, but additionally backwards movement allowed. Variant 5 thru 8: As variant 1 thru 4, but the pawns can only capture straight forward. Variant 9 thru 12: As variant 1 thru 4, but the pawns can also capture NEE and NWW. Variant 13: Standard chess plus: pawns can also capture NEE and NWW. Black Hole Chess The centre of the board (squares d4, d5, e4, e5) is replaced by a "Black Hole". Any piece that moves to square of the Black hole ends outside the board (but is still your piece). Hence the squares d4, d5, e4, e5 never carry any chess pieces. The king cannot enter the Black Hole. At a cost of a turn, you may re-insert a piece from your bank account to an empty place on the board any time later. Pawns can only be re-inserted from rank two to rank seven. Black Hole Chess - Swap variant Only one piece is allowed to be in your bank account at any time. If you put another one out, you forfeit the piece in your account. Burnt Chess - Swap variant When you capture a piece, the starting square becomes unavailable for further play. To mark the square, put a token (e.g., a cent piece) on this square. Cannibal Chess You may eat your own pieces. For such a sacrifice you are compensated: In the standard version of Cannibal Chess, you may reinsert the piece at any time later (and forfeit one move). As a variant, you are compensated instead by another move with the same piece. Checkers Chess In addition to their standard moves, the King, Queen, Bishop and Rook may jump like in Checkers. If the piece that is being jumped over is an enemy, then it is captured. As a variant the Pawns may also jump. Depending on the variant, the Pawn-jumps may be only diagonally or also forward. Cloak Chess You cloak some or all of the chess pieces by replacing them with monochrome tokens. White and Black may or may not use the same type of tokens. Companion Chess You may only move a piece that has another friendly piece orthogonally placed next to it . Only if you cannot move that way you are allowed to make any legal chess move. Crazy Pawns Variants Additional to their standard moves, Pawns also move (only to an empty square) like a Queen (or a Rook or a Knight or a Bishop or a King, depending on the variant). In some variants these additional moves are restricted to being sideways and forward. Cross-eyed Chess You move one way, but you capture as if you had moved into the opposite way. E.g. Rook h4-h3 captures on h5. En passant works the same way, if a8 is empty, Black's move c7-c5 may be answered by b7-a8Qxc6. Note that the Queen stays on a8 after White's move! Deadly Pawns Chess Any enemy piece diagonally opposite a Pawn with be immediately eliminated. In variant 2 any enemy piece adjacent to a Pawn is immediately eliminated. Deflector Chess The Pawns act as deflectors in the following sense: A Rook, Bishop or Queen may move to a square that is occupied by a friendly Pawn. The piece then has another partial move into a direction that is at right angles to the original direction of the move. The partial move is forced. After the partial move, the temporarily hidden Pawn reappears. Double Chess On a double size board (16x8), White has two sets of white pieces, Black has two sets of black pieces. Castling is executed as if there would be two separate boards. . You have to checkmate only one of the two kings of your opponent. Double Move Chess A piece is allowed to make two moves per turn. Depending on the variant, the second partial move is only allowed under certain conditions: Variant 1: Second partial move always allowed. Variant 2: Second partial move only when first move was a capture. Variant 3: Second partial move only when first move was not a capture. Variant 4: Second partial move only when second move is a capture. Variant 5: Second partial move only when second move is not a capture. Variant 6: Second partial move only when both moves are captures. Variant 7: Second partial move only when neither move is a capture. Variant 8: Second partial move only when into the same direction. Variant 9: Second partial move only when not into the same direction. There is no double move when castling or promoting. In the first partial move the king may move into check Fastpawn Chess A pawn is allowed to make two (in another variant three) standard pawn moves at a time. Fortress Chess All chess pieces are used in the setup. The rooks are on b1, g1, b8, g8. The a-file and h-file do not contain any pawns. Castling moves king and rook to the same places as in standard chess. Freeze Chess If the piece that moved last attacks any enemy pieces, then these pieces are not allowed to move in the next turn. A piece attacking the king can get frozen itself. In this case the king is allowed to stay in check. By his freezing power, a king may move next to the opponent's queen or next to the other king, for example. The latter case means that one king can checkmate the other king! Deepfreeze Chess Any piece on the board that is in an attacking line of any other piece on the board is immobilized. A piece attacking the king can get frozen itself. In this case the king is allowed to stay in check. By his freezing power, a king may move next to the opponent's queen or next to the other king, for example. In the latter case both kings cannot move ever again! You win if you either checkmate the opponent's king or if you immobilize your opponent without being fully immobilized youtself. Hades Chess A captured piece may be reinserted as one of lesser value at any later point in the game: A Queen comes back as Rook, the Rook as a Bishop, the Bishop as a Knight, the Knight as a Pawn (reinserted on ranks 2 to 7 only), but a captured Pawn disappears. Hungry Pawns A pawn can capture many pieces in one turn. It can keep capturing as long as there is an enemy in its reach. Limpy Chess A knight cannot jump, but only 'limp': it moves as normal, but the square orthogonally adjacent to it must be empty before it can go there and then move on one step diagonally.. Onwards Chess Pieces are only allowed to move forward or sideways. When they hit the eighth rank (for black the first rank), the rule is reversed: they can only move backwrds or sideways. The moving direction reverses again when they hit the opposite border. One-two Chess In ONE-TWO CHESS you move once with your opponent's pieces, then twice with your pieces. You are allowed to move your king or your opponent's king into check at any time. You are allowed to capture your opponent's king. Pass Chess Either player may accumulate additional moves per turn by passing a move at any time in the game. To stop White from having an overwhelming attack in the opening, the free turns may be restricted to certain piece types. Penalty Chess If a player captures a piece, his opponent may move twice. In the standard version of Penalty Chess, the second move by the opponent is forced. As a variant, the second move may be optional. Promotion Chess Whenever a piece hits the eighth rank (for Black the first rank), it may promote to any other piece apart from a pawn. River Chess Variant 1: All you have to do is to get one of your pieces to the far rank The king is non-royal and can be taken at any time. Variant 2: Like variant 1, but in order to win the piece landing on the far rank has to be safe from being taken in the next move. Statue Chess Captured pieces may be reinserted any time later (Pawns from the 2nd to 7th rank). Reinserted pieces turn to "statues": they cannot move, but can capture any piece in their normal range. If a statue is captured, it is deleted and not stored. You might have to mark the statues appropriately. Swap variant of Statue Chess: Only one piece can be stored at any time. When the second piece is captured, the first piece is lost. Sticky Chess A moving piece drags a friendly piece with it if: - the friendly piece is positioned to the South of it. - the target square for the dragged piece is empty. En passant is only possible if the captured Pawn did not drag a piece with it. Two-one Chess In TWO-ONE CHESS you move twice with your pieces, then once with your opponent's pieces. Transfer Chess (for two players) Transfer Chess is played on two separete chess boards simultaneously. Player Blue has White on the first board, Black on the second board. Player Red has Black on the first board, White on the second board. Captured pieces are stored and can be re-inserted on the other board by the player who captured the piece. A turn consists of one move only. The player choses which board he/she wants to make his/her move on. You have to checkmate only one of the two kings of your opponent.. Transfer Chess - Swap Variant Like Transfer Chess, but only the piece captured last is allowed to stored and re-inserted. Siince there are two boards, you may have one black piece and one white piece stored. Transfer Chess - Parallel Variant You make a move on either of the two boards. No transfer of pieces allowed! Transparent Chess Depending on the variant, all or only the friendly pieces or only the enemy pieces are transparent. Transparency means that a Rook, Bishop or Queen can move right through them and land on any empty square behind. A piece which moves through a transparent piece cannot capture in the same move. Twin Chess If possible, you make a second, "twin" move after your standard move. A twin move is a move with a piece of the same piece type, going into the same direction and covering the same length. Eg. Pawn e2-e4 may be followed by Pawn h2-h4 in the same turn. During the game, Rh1-g1 may be followed by Rf6-e6 in the same turn.. That way you may capture two pieces in one turn. However, en passent can only capture one piece! If no twin move is possible, it is the opponent's turn to move. In standard Twin Chess, the twin move is forced. As a variation, the twin move may be optional.
Game: Cheer Chess Invented and implemented by K. Franklin, October 2002. After running a half-marathon (Port Perry, ON, Canada), I was impressed with the experience of being cheered along by spectators, fellow runners, and water/aid volunteers. This chess game is based on being cheered! So whenever a Cheer is on a piece's row, that piece is boosted to allow better moves. Description: All pieces all boosted by the sideline Cheer. The Cheer only moves ahead one square after each move. When a side's Cheer is alongside, that row's pieces can perform extra moves. Besides a piece's own moves - A Pawn takes on Knight moves, A Knight takes on Bishop moves, A Bishop takes on Rook moves, A Rook takes on Queen moves, A Queen (only gets King moves), A King is allowed all moves (Queen & Knight) The Cheer can not be captured or blocked, consider it 'off-board'. Object: Besides Checkmate, another goal is for the King to cross the Finish line up ahead; no defensive blocking is allowed inside the opponent's finish area. Download Cheer Chess Now!
Game: Chess 2000 Invented by Gerhard Josten, implemented by Uwe Wiedemann, November 2001 Chess 2000 is like usual chess. One rook and knight of each player is substituted by the well-known fairy chess pieces Chancellor and Cardinal. Pawns can additionally promote to Chancellors and Cardinals. Castling rules remain the same for the King, but now involve a Rook or a Chancellor. Download Chess 2000 Now!
Game: Chess 68 Invented and implemented by Setti Roberto, January 2001. Chess 68 is a game created by myself, basically in order to give more depth to standard chess and imprevedibility. Experienced players can continue to use their opening strategies because new pieces get in action only after several moves, in order to give them the necessary space to walk outside. It looks like standard Chess, with the following modifications: 4 more squares linked to the 4 corner squares (idea taken from "Omega Chess"), these squares takes the coordinates as their ranks and files were present and contiguous: z0, i0 for white; z9, i9 for black. These added squares modify drammatically the standard finals theory and minimum material needed for mating. i.e = Lonely Rook now is not sufficient if the opposite king safely reaches corner squares; in the contrary two knights, now taking advantages of corner squares, can force mate ! 2 more pieces: The Prince: Moves like a king. Can cover up to 8 squares and it's valued 3 pawns. Its power is maximum when used in defensive tasks particularly for protecting its own king. In the downside, its slow moving and quite far position at the start force it to move outside later. Like all the standard pieces except for the Knights, Prince must wait the development of the nearby Rook (usually by castling) before going into action. In a second variant called "Flanking Bishops" it can develop easily. The Master: Combines the moves of knight and a king. Can cover up to 20 squares, and great range of forks as it's still a leaper. Excellent for both attack and defense, this piece (valued about 7 pawns) stands in power between the Queen and the Rook; but it's actually the best piece can be promoted to, by a pawn. In the middle game his power equals even the Queen. In a second variant called "Flanking Bishops" can be rapidly developed. The new setup has been created looking at innovative "Omega Chess", in particular the 4 corner squares that give the possibility to insert 2 new pieces for each side leaving the same armony in disposition of the chessboard. The main difference is the chessboard itself that is always 8x8, this to get easier for new people to play inside their own standard chessboards. Updated 03/08/03 better set-up Download Chess 68 Now!
Game: Chess: My Way Implemented by Adam Burns, November 2000. Adam Burns wanted to change gnuchess to run variations. Then Z came and he started to make the variants that The Variant Team play at lunch. Chess: My Way packages these variants nicely in one zrf file. The chess variants included are: Chess: May Way The traditional game. Object: Checkmate the opponent's King. 10 x 10 Chess on a 10x10 board, where the 'new' Scribe moves like a traditional Queen and the Queen adds a Knight's move to her arsenal. Atomic Chess, invented by Scot Saxton Every Piece that takes, makes an explosion! Dazzed Pawns, invented by Russle Ricks All the same but every pawn is turned around. Death Chess, invented by Russle Ricks Normal Chess rules but taking a piece stronger than a pawn to the other side turns the piece around and into a pawn. No pawns in the begining. Kamekazie, idea by Adam's friend Ed If you can take a piece you have to regardless if you want to or not Phase You can store your pieces for later use. (like Bank Chess from Karl Scherer) Power Adds power to certain types of moves depending on were they are on the board. Knights get and extra boost on the sides. Rook moves can go though pieces when in the middle. And bishop moves can bounce when in the sides. Mobios-Wrap The left and right sides of the board are bound: the bottom row continues on the top row, the second row continues on the seventh row, etc.. Wacky mirror The 4th and 5th row of the board are (strangely) bound. Wrap The left and right sides of the board are bound, so your effectively playing on a cylinder. Mix1: Kamikazie and Wrap This is the MOST dificult way to play Chess! Your are forced to take pieces, but the wrap increases the mobilty of your Queen and Bishop. Mix2: Atomic and Phase Download Chess: My Way Now!
Game: Chess-Tac-Toe Implemented by David Howe. An ingenious combination of Chess and Tic-Tac-Toe: two players battle it out for checkmate ...or to get 3-in-a-row! Several variants. A separate game with Knights (Knight-Tac-Toe) is also included. Updated 03/03/02 Fixed image loading Download Chess-Tac-Toe Now!
Game: Chess II, the Resurrection Invented by Buddy Smith, 1999 Implemented by Karl Scherer, May 2000 Object: Checkmate the opponent's King. Unlike traditional chess, Chess II gives the player a second chance. Chess II introduces the Jester, the Prince and the Wizard. On capture some pieces become another: the Jester becomes the Wizard, the Prince becomes the King. To see a description of how a piece moves right-click on it from within the program to bring up its properties dialog. Download Chess II, the Resurrection Now!
Game: Chess Cubed Invented and implemented by L. Lynn Smith, May 2001. Played within a 4x4x4 cube. Due to the compression of the field, there must be a compression of the mobility of the Queen, Rook, Bishop and Knight. The White Pawn steps one orthogonal down, attacks one diagonal down. It promotes upon reaching the lowest level. The Black Pawn steps one orthogonal up, attacks one diagonal up. It promotes upon reaching the highest level. There are no two-cell moves for the Pawn, therefore En Passant is not necessary. The Knight steps triagonal. The Rook steps orthogonal. The Bishop steps diagonal. The Queen steps orthogonal, diagonal or triagonal. The King steps orthogonal or diagonal. Castling can be accomplished by moving the King over one of the Rooks. The King will take the position of the Rook and the Rook will change one level. Any cell between the two pieces must be empty and the two pieces cannot have been previously moved. It is only necessary to relocated the Queen if the player wishes to castle Queen's side. King's side can be castled on the first move. The King cannot be under attack, nor any cell which it must translate. The Rook is allowed to move onto an attacked cell. The object is to checkmate the opponent's King. You may notice that the King can be mated with just the Queen. Go ahead and try. There have been several versions of 4x4x4 chess proposed. This is my product of several decades of development and my personal favorite. Send comments to: llsmith@ev1.net Updated 05/10/03 streamlined code (plays much better now); added game descriptions Download Chess Cubed Now!
Game: Chess on the Rainbows Invented and implemented by Ingo Althofer, February 2003. All rules of normal chess apply. However, the board is colored in several colors - like a rainbow. Besides the normal checkmating there is another winning way: If for one of the colors a player has no piece on a square of this color, he has lost. This rainbow conditions count even higher than the normal 'checkmating': If in the same moment Player A is checkmated and Player B has no piece on say a yellow square then Player B has lost. Independently of this priority setting most games are decided by a rainbow condition. The drawing quota in "Chess on the Rainbows" is extremely low. After some piece exchanges it really becomes difficult to keep all colors 'occupied'. So, if you can sacrifice a minor piece for three pawns you typically should try it, because 'three pieces less' means that the opponent will have increased problems to find occupants for all the board colors. Observe that not all colors are equally dangerous! The game comes with variants for five and for six colors. The Zillions game "Deep Blue versus Kasparov" is a very special version of rainbow chess with three - blue - colors. Please note: Chess on the Rainbows requires Zillions of Games version 2.0 (or higher)! Download Chess on the Rainbows Now!
Game: Chesseract Chesseract © Jim Aikin Implemented by Robert Price Aikin's detailed treatment of the rules for Chesseract can be found on the Chess Variant Pages (http://www.chessvariants.com/large.dir/contest/chesseract.html). The board is a four-dimensional cube (a tesseract -- get it?) measuring four cells on a side. Most of the pieces are familiar from Chess, and behave analogously. The King has been deprived of his diagonal move, and the rook has gained the ability to turn the corner when it encounters an edge of the board. The Unicorn moves like a Knight, but takes an extra step in a direction perpendicular to the first two. The Wizard moves more diagonally than the Bishop, and the Minstrel is a peaceful being who moves as the Rook and prevents adjacent enemies from capturing. The author describes the game as "virtually unplayable", owing to the difficulty in visualizing the moves for all the pieces; but Zillions makes it easy! The game fits in an 800x600 desktop, just barely, if the toolbar and such are turned off. You should extract the downloaded zip file preserving path names. Download Chesseract Now!
Game: Chessers Invented and implemented by Harvey Patterson, April 2002 Chessers is a combination of chess and checkers. Like checkers, both sides begin play with 12 pieces situated on the 12 dark squares closest to them; only the dark squares are used for play; and black moves first. Like chess the pieces capture by occupying the enemy's square rather than by jumping and the game is won by checkmating the opposing King. Other than being confined to the dark squares all pieces (not pawns) move the same as in chess: Bishops move any number of squares diagonally; Rooks move any number of squares vertically or horizontally to another dark square; the Queen combines the abilities of the Rook and Bishop; the King can move to any adjacent dark square or castle with the Rook. As in checkers the Pawns move only diagonally forward and promote on the back rank but, as in chess, they may promote to any piece other than a King. When castling the King moves one dark square towards the Rook and the Rook leaps to the square the King left. Since Rooks have no method of moving diagonally they are confined to only half of the dark squares. To make this easier to visualize Chessers uses a special double-checker board which makes half of the dark squares blue and the other half green. If this is found to be annoying, distracting or otherwise unhelpful it may be removed in the future. Chessers includes a second piece set which uses checkers pieces for the King and Pawns which may be preferable for 'Pawns Only' and 'Pure' variants. This game is young and may see minor changes in the future. Game and rules file are Copyright 2002 Harvey Patterson. Official web page is http://members.rogers.com/chessopolis/chessers.html Updated 04/27/02 win rule changed; added variant Download Chessers Now!
Game: Chessgi Zrf implementation by Fergus Duniho Copyright © 1999-2000 Chessgi is a hybrid of Chess and Shogi. It has been reinvented many times, and Ralph Betza is responsible for naming it Chessgi. It is basically Chess with the addition of drops from Shogi. Whenever you capture a piece, you replace it with the same piece of your own color, and you hold it in hand with the option to drop it on a subsequent turn. If you have any pieces in hand, you may use your turn to drop a piece on an empty square. This counts as your full turn. You may not move a piece and drop a piece on the same turn. Any Pawn on the second rank has the option of a double move. Although Chessgi is intended as a hybrid of Chess and Shogi, the rules of Chessgi differ from Shogi in some notable respects. Promoted pieces remain promoted when captured. They do not demote back to Pawns. Pawn drops are less restricted than in Shogi. Pawns may be dropped on any empty square except those on the last rank, and a dropped Pawn is allowed to checkmate. The same ZRF includes the game Shatranji, invented by myself, which is a hybrid of Shatranj and Shogi. Shatranj is an early Chess variant that is included in the Zillions Fairy Chess ZRF. Shatranji is just like Chessgi except for being based on Shatranj rather than Chess. I invented the game, because a Shogi-like game may work better with weaker pieces, and some of the pieces in Shatranj are weaker than their counterparts in Chess. The image below is from a Chessgi game I won against Zillions. The ZRF gives you the option of four different piece sets. These include the abstract set pictured with Mortal Chessgi, the magnetic set I included with Magnetic Chess, the motif set pictured with Crazyhouse, and the default Zillions set. Only the abstract set includes specially designed pieces for Shatranji. For more games by Fergus Duniho, goto http://www.duniho.com/fergus/games [ur="ftp://ftp.zillionsofgames.com/games/chessgi.zip"]Download Chessgi Now![/url]
Game: Chess Rotation Implemented by Gregory J. McClure, May 2002 Chess Rotation is a variant based on standard chess. The file Chess.ZRF, V.1.2, was used as the base file for the changes. The major differences are: Certain pieces may rotate for a given turn instead of move. Only pawns, bishops, and rooks may rotate. All pawns, no matter what orientation, are considered pawns. (This is important in the Elimination Chess Rotation variant) Only pawns in the original orientation (before any rotation, or after cancelling rotations) are allowed to perform an 'en passant' type capture. Pawns may rotate to any other multiple of 45 degrees less than 360 degrees from the current position. Bishops may rotate into a rook, rooks may rotate into a bishop. The file ChessOriginal.zrf is the original chess.zrf with the new piece bitmaps. The file ChessRotation.zrf is the new rotation variants of all games in chess.zrf. ----- also included ----- Fairy Rotation is a variant based on fairy chess. The file Chess,_Fairy.zrf, V.1.3, was used as the base file for the changes. The major difference are: Certain pieces may rotate for a given turn instead of move. Pawns (normal, weak, berolina, berolina-plus), bishops, rooks, ferses, wazirs, maos, alfils, alfilriders, dabbabas, dabbabariders, camels, camelriders, zebras, zebrariders, princesses, and empresses may rotate. All pawns, no matter what orientation, are considered pawns. (This is important in the Elimination Chess Rotation variant) Only pawns in the original orientation (before any rotation, or after cancelling rotations) are allowed to perform an 'en passant' type capture. Pawns may rotate to any other multiple of 45 degrees less than 360 degrees from the current position. Berolina Plus Chess has been added to the list of variants, and the Berolina Plus Pawn added to the set of pieces. The following pieces rotate into each other: Bishop -- Rook, Fers -- Wazir, Mao -- Reverse Mao, Alfil -- Dabbaba, Alfilrider -- Dabbabarider, Camel -- Zebra, Camelrider -- Zebrarider, Princess -- Empress The file FairyOriginal.zrf is the original Chess,_Fairy.zrf with the new piece bitmaps and the additional Berolina Plus Chess variant. The file FairyRotation.zrf is the new rotation variants of all games in Chess,_Fairy.zrf. Download Chess Rotation Now!
Game: Chinese Chess Graphics update by Fergus Duniho While David Howe was working on his westernized Chinese Chess set, I was working on enhancing the aesthetic quality of the graphics that come with Zillions' Chinese Chess ZRF. This graphics updates includes a new board and four new piece sets. These sets are: Traditional Chinese characters on wood discs (shown below) Simplified Chinese Characters on wood discs Pictures on wood discs Abstract Chess piece images on marble discs For more games by Fergus Duniho, goto http://www.duniho.com/fergus/games Download Chinese Chess Now!
Game: Chinese Chess Western Style Implemented by Zillions of Games Graphical modifications by David Howe, June 2001 This version of Chinese Chess has been modified to make it easier to learn for players more familiar with Western (or European) Chess. The pieces are styled after figurines instead of using Chinese Characters, the pieces are placed on squares instead of on the intersections of lines, and the board is checkered to make visualization of diagonal moves easier. For more information on Chinese Chess, visit: http://www.chessvariants.com/xiangqi.html The piece graphics used in this game were generated from the Chess Alpha font by Eric Bentzen. Download Chinese Chess Western Style Now!
Game: Chromatic Chess Implemented by Karl Scherer, April 2001 Object: Checkmate the opponent's King. (2 variants) Variant 1: Monochromatic Chess A piece can only move to a square of same colour. Hence Knights cannot move at all (but they keep the opponent's King from moving onto the squares they are threatening), and castling can only be done on the King's side. Pawns can only move forward two steps in the first move, but can capture. Variant 2: Bichromatic Chess A piece can only move to a square of different colour. Hence Bishops cannot move at all (but they keep the opponent's King from moving onto the squares they are threatening), and castling can only be done on the Queen's side. Pawns cannot capture. Apart from this the standard chess rules apply. References to Chromatic Chess can be found in several places; e.g. see Raymond Smullyan's book 'The Chess Mysteries of Sherlock Holmes'. More freeware as well as real puzzles and games at http://karl.kiwi.gen.nz. Download Chromatic Chess Now!
Game: Chu (Middle) Shogi Implemented by Steve Evans, who has used Zillions to solve old Chu Shogi problems. Six variants: Chu (Middle) Shogi Handicap Game - 3 Lions and 2 Pieces Handicap Game - 3 Lions Handicap Game - 2 Lions Handicap Game - Vertical Mover Handicap Game - Copper General Chu Shogi also includes an alternative piece set (Japanese Kanji). Please note: Chu Shogi requires Zillions of Games version 1.1 (or higher)! Updated 4/23/00 Fixes a couple of bugs that were introduced in the previous release. Download Chu Shogi Now!
Game: Circular Chess Invented by Dave Reynolds, 1983 Implemented by Chris Weimer, March 2001 Circular Chess is, as is to be expected, modern chess played on a circular board. There are very few changes to the rules of modern international chess (no castling, no en passent). It was invented in 1983 and has a small following. The game is derived from Byzantine Chess, a medieval Shatranj variant, and both games are included in this .zrf. Unfortunately, the game as implemented is on a very large (600x600) board, so you will need to have your display properties set to at least 1024x768 to play. Download Circular Chess Now!
Game: Circular Chess Invented by Dave Reynolds, 1983, implemented by Robert Price, October 2001. Object: Checkmate the opponent's King. Pawns do not capture en passant and there is no castling. Otherwise rules are as in Chess, with the movements of pieces adapted to the new board. Pawns do promote when they reach a space originally occupied by an opposing non-pawn. Circular Chess was invented in 1983 by Dave Reynolds, the founder of The Circular Chess Society. Reynolds was inspired by a picture in a book from 1905 showing an 11th-century circular chess board (probably Byzantine Chess or a descendant thereof). Download Circular Chess Now!
Game: Clash of Command Invented and implemented by Peter Stobbe, May 2001. Created by Peter Stobbe for the 41-squares chess variant design contest. email comments to: pgs@ugcs.caltech.edu. Game goal: You win when your opponent has no commanders left. General rules: Movement is always along the lines on the board. You may capture your own pieces. Any piece that reaches your opponent's back row transforms to a Slicer. Brief description of pieces (view piece properties for more detail): DROID: Moves forward to an empty node, or captures sideways or backwards. Transforms to HAWK after moving. HAWK: Moves forward to an empty node, or captures in any direction by jumping, approaching or withdrawing. Transforms to DROID after moving. FACTOR: Moves forward to an empty node, leaving behind a DROID or HAWK. Or transforms without moving to a DROID or HAWK. COMMANDER: Moves forward to an empty node, leaving behind a FACTOR or BRUTE. Or transforms without moving to a FACTOR or BRUTE. BRUTE: Captures by moving onto a piece one or two nodes away, in any direction(s). May not move without capturing. SLICER: Moves any number of nodes in any direction, capturing all pieces along the way. May not move without capturing. One feature of note about the game is that draws are impossible. This may not help you win, but it's nice to know. Download Clash of Command Now!
