Chessplus

Last updated
Chessplus
Chessplus Cover.jpeg
Chessplus cover art, featuring the knawn, a combination of the knight and pawn, as well as both taglines.
PublishersChessplus Team
Years activec. 21st century to present
Genres Board game
Abstract strategy game
Mind sport
Chess variant
Players2
Playing time5–55 minutes[ citation needed ]
ChanceNone
Skills Strategy, tactics

Chessplus is a chess variant developed by the Australia-based family business Chessplus Team. [1]

Contents

Appearance

Chessplus, as a physical variant, can come in 1 of 3 packages. [2]

  1. A bag, containing all the pieces.
  2. A box featuring a pawn and knight combining into a knawn.
  3. A pseudo-box with a wrap-around board and pieces.

As for the pieces, they are designed so players can merge them. [3]

Gameplay

Chessplus gameplay is similar to that of regular chess, but pieces can merge. The only piece that can't be merged with is the king. [4] Pieces can only merge with other pieces of their own color. Only 2 pieces can be merged at a time. Pieces may split, in which they use their original move to un-merge.

Names of Piece Combinations [5]
First PieceSecond PieceCombination Name
QueenQueenDQueen
QueenBishopQuishop
QueenKnight Quight
QueenRookQuook
QueenPawnQuawn
BishopKnight Bight
BishopBishopDBishop
BishopRookBiook
BishopPawnBiawn
KnightKnightDKnight
KnightRook Knook
KnightPawnKnawn
PawnPawnDPawn

Castling

Castling may be done with a combined rook. Just like in regular chess, the rook must not have previously moved. In other words, if a knight moved to combine with a rook, castling is possible, but if that rook moved to combine with the knight, then castling is no longer allowed for that rook.

En passant

Similar to the castling rules, en passant can only be used on a combination of 2 pawns. [5] If the combination is, say, a biawn, the combination of a bishop and a pawn, then en passant is not allowed.

Inspiration

It was inspired by an illegal move made by the leader's daughter, Aimee, who, at age 8, during a chess match with her father, decided to move a rook to a pawn's square, then promoted the piece to a queen. [6]

Reception

Chessplus received generally positive reviews. [4] [7] [8]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chess piece</span> Game piece for playing chess

A chess piece, or chessman, is a game piece that is placed on a chessboard to play the game of chess. It can be either white or black, and it can be one of six types: king, queen, rook, bishop, knight, or pawn.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pawn (chess)</span> Chess piece

The pawn is the most numerous and weakest piece in the game of chess. It may move one square directly forward, it may move two squares directly forward on its first move, and it may capture one square diagonally forward. Each player begins a game with eight pawns, one on each square of their second rank. The white pawns start on a2 through h2; the black pawns start on a7 through h7.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rules of chess</span> Rules of play for the game of chess

The rules of chess govern the play of the game of chess. Chess is a two-player abstract strategy board game. Each player controls sixteen pieces of six types on a chessboard. Each type of piece moves in a distinct way. The object of the game is to checkmate the opponent's king; checkmate occurs when a king is threatened with capture and has no escape. A game can end in various ways besides checkmate: a player can resign, and there are several ways a game can end in a draw.

Circe chess is a chess variant in which captured pieces are reborn on their starting positions as soon as they are captured. The game was invented by French composer Pierre Monréal in 1967 and the rules of Circe chess were first detailed by Monréal and Jean-Pierre Boyer in an article in Problème, 1968.

Capablanca chess is a chess variant invented in the 1920s by World Chess Champion José Raúl Capablanca. It incorporates two new pieces and is played on a 10×8 board. Capablanca believed that chess would be played out in a few decades. This threat of "draw death" for chess was his main motivation for creating a more complex version of the game.

A fairy chess piece, variant chess piece, unorthodox chess piece, or heterodox chess piece is a chess piece not used in conventional chess but incorporated into certain chess variants and some chess problems. Compared to conventional pieces, fairy pieces vary mostly in the way they move, but they may also follow special rules for capturing, promotions, etc. Because of the distributed and uncoordinated nature of unorthodox chess development, the same piece can have different names, and different pieces can have the same name in various contexts as it can be noted in the list of fairy chess pieces.

Dark chess is a chess variant with incomplete information, similar to Kriegspiel. It was invented by Jens Bæk Nielsen and Torben Osted in 1989. A player does not see the entire board – only their own pieces and the squares that they can legally move to.

Tamerlane chess is a medieval chess variant. Like modern chess, it is derived from shatranj. It was developed in Central Asia during the reign of Emperor Timur, and its invention is also attributed to him. Because Tamerlane chess is a larger variant of chaturanga, it is also called Shatranj Al-Kabir, as opposed to Shatranj as-saghir. Although the game is similar to modern chess, it is distinctive in that there are varieties of pawn, each of which promotes in its own way.

Dice chess can refer to a number of chess variants in which dice are used to alter gameplay; specifically that the moves available to each player are determined by rolling a pair of ordinary six-sided dice. There are many different variations of this form of dice chess. One of them is described here.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hexagonal chess</span> Set of chess variants played on a board with hexagonal cells

Hexagonal chess is a group of chess variants played on boards composed of hexagon cells. The best known is Gliński's variant, played on a symmetric 91-cell hexagonal board.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Minichess</span> Family of chess variants played on a smaller board

Minichess is a family of chess variants played with regular chess pieces and standard rules, but on a smaller board. The motivation for these variants is to make the game simpler and shorter than standard chess. The first chess-like game implemented on a computer was the 6×6 chess variant Los Alamos chess. The low memory capacity of early computers meant that a reduced board size and a smaller number of pieces were required for the game to be implementable on a computer.

Omega Chess is a commercial chess variant designed and released in 1992 by Daniel MacDonald. The game is played on a 10×10 board with four extra squares, each added diagonally adjacent to the corner squares. The game is laid out like standard chess with the addition of a champion in each corner of the 10×10 board and a wizard in each new added corner square.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Outline of chess</span> Strategy board game

The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to chess:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wildebeest chess</span> Chess variant

Wildebeest chess is a chess variant created by R. Wayne Schmittberger in 1987. The Wildebeest board is 11×10 squares. Besides the standard chess pieces, each side has two camels and one "wildebeest" - a piece which may move as either a camel or a knight.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rhombic chess</span> Chess variant

Rhombic chess is a chess variant for two players created by Tony Paletta in 1980. The gameboard has an overall hexagonal shape and comprises 72 rhombi in three alternating colors. Each player commands a full set of standard chess pieces.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Triangular chess (game)</span> Chess variant

Triangular chess is a chess variant for two players invented by George R. Dekle Sr. in 1986. The game is played on a hexagon-shaped gameboard comprising 96 triangular cells. Each player commands a full set of chess pieces in addition to three extra pawns and a unicorn.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chesquerque</span> Variant of chess

Chesquerque is a chess variant invented by George R. Dekle Sr. in 1986. The game is played on a board composed of four Alquerque boards combined into a square. Like Alquerque, pieces are positioned on points of intersection and make their moves along marked lines ; as such, the board comprises a 9×9 grid with 81 positions (points) that pieces can move to.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Falcon–hunter chess</span>

Falcon–hunter chess is a chess variant invented by Karl Schultz in 1943, employing the two fairy chess pieces falcon and hunter. The game takes several forms, including variations hunter chess and decimal falcon–hunter chess added in the 1950s.

Dynamo chess is a chess variant invented by chess problemists Hans Klüver and Peter Kahl in 1968. The invention was inspired by the closely related variant push chess, invented by Fred Galvin in 1967. The pieces, board, and starting position of Dynamo chess are the same as in orthodox chess, but captures are eliminated and enemy pieces are instead "pushed" or "pulled" off the board. On any given move, a player can make a standard move as in orthodox chess, or execute a "push move" or a "pull move". A move that is either a push move or a pull move is called a "dynamo move".

References

  1. Noone, Richard (18 May 2017). "Coastie conjures new form of the ancient game of chess". Daily Telegraph (Central Coast Gosford Express Advocate). Retrieved 18 Aug 2023.
  2. "The Chessplus Range". Chessplus. Retrieved 2024-02-08.
  3. The board game itself
  4. 1 2 "The Meeple Guild - ChessPlus fun twist to classic favourite". SaskToday.ca. 2020-01-26. Retrieved 2023-08-04.
  5. 1 2 "How to Play". Chessplus.
  6. "Our Story - Chessplus". During a game of Chess with her dad the young Aimee (aged 8) did something not so legal. With a cheeky smile Aimee moved her rook onto the square of a pawn. Her dad looked on puzzled and made a traditional Chess move. With her next move Aimee took both the rook and the pawn to the far side of the board and proudly announced 'I get a queen, I'm going to beat you!' Her dad laughed, then he reflected on her actions and Chessplus was born.
  7. "Chessplus | Jim Gamer". What Board Game. Retrieved 2024-03-15.
  8. "Chessplus: Combine & Conquer". Board's Eye View. 2022-11-19. Retrieved 2024-03-18.

Further reading