Announcing Chess 2
sirlin.net
sirlin.net
I took a quick look at the rules and it seems like an interesting game, but from a game design perspective, it's a radical departure from vanilla chess.
And draws are only very common at high-level play. It's not even clear this variant would solve that.
Also, there is no such thing as a "solved problem" in the design of complex systems.
I have suspicion that that can lead to very early wins. "Move pawn, then rush king to fifth row" might be beatable, but I guess there are quite a few "recklessly run for row 5, and just make it" paths in the search tree. An easy way to counteract that may be bringing the queen and rooks into play early, but I would exchange them and then start the race for row 5.
Frame the game as two armies racing to occupy an oasis (four center squares of the board) in the desert. Consider that oasis occupied if either the enemy's king is captured, or if your king can camp there for X moves (if your king can camp there, the area can't be part of the front anymore, so it is truly yours)
I chose an oasis rather than a true stronghold such as a fort or castle because a fort or castle would have to mean the introduction of separate rules for attacks into and out of the stronghold (hm, that might be fun, too. Consider a case where captures into the four center squares require the capturer to have at least two means to make that capture.)
You can't just add 5 new races to the game and expect it to work out perfectly.
Agreed, however it may make it more interesting to a lot of people.
So if we talk about balance in chess, I think we mean something deeper than your view of the concept: the harmony between its different aspects, like attack vs defence, strategical vs tactical thinking, calculation vs aesthetics etc.
More like balance in art.
A "well-balanced painting" is not simply the most symmetrical one :) That's the easiest thing to achieve, but that's not the point, I believe
When I was younger I picked up a set at the USCF youth nationals chess tournament, it is a fun break from regular chess because it gets you back to thinking on your feet.
Nevertheless, I applaud game designer to have the balls to try to evolve something so established. Loving chess a lot, I'll certainly give that a try.
Maybe it's the case at the beginning, when realtime can be overwhelming, but at higher level, people have a lot of different tactics, be it build orders (like chess openings), general game flow and timing, specific offensive tactics (there are actually so many that getting information about what your opponent is doing is one of the most critical part of the game) and choosing army composition based on opponent's one weak points.
As for strategy, I think fast decision making should be considered in the field of strategy too : you have to act quick while still following a bigger plan, and be quick to change it in case of problem. After all, nobody would say blitz chess games are not about strategy. But yes, it can feel totally random for casual players, just like blitz chess.
I am not debating whether Starcraft has strategy, tactics or whether fast decision making is a cool element of a game. I think it's all true. It's just that in Starcraft those things are all only relevant when you're better at manipulating units than your opponent is.
It's what makes Starcraft more a sport than a game.
[1]: http://membres-lig.imag.fr/prost/Twilight_Chess/index.html
As to memorization of openings, the current world champion Magnus Carlsen thinks the attention to opening theory is overrated.
The only thing that really bothers me is that an opponent can continue to play a position that's obviously lost for a number of hours. I think adding the concept of a doubling cube (like in Backgammon) might address this.
They're not, really. They date back to middle ages. Quite recent is only that they were made "official" and rules were uniformized.
As to memorization of openings, the current world champion Magnus Carlsen thinks the attention to opening theory is overrated.
Yes, but you need to know the context in which he thinks it's "overrated" :)
It's not unusual these days that more than half of the game is prepared at home.
Eg. when Topalov played Anand in World Championship 2010, Anand lost the first game, because he forgot the correct 23rd move of his home preparation. The game went on for 7 more moves.
For a flash-in-the-pan iOS game title, that might be okay, but if you're actually trying to reinvent something like chess--something with hundreds of generations of people who have come into a thriving "chess culture" and added their own contributions to it--then you have to aim high.