Chess Variants & Games Paperback – December 1, 2011

I got this for my kindle because I love perusing the chessvariants wiki online and thought this would be similar. Instead it is a collection of the author's inventions, most of which are on really strange boards using geometries that seem entirely impractical for actual play, or are crossovers between chess and field games, or chess and crossword puzzles. (I didn't see any fairy chess examples, though I admit that after the first couple of chapters I just skimmed.) As far as I could tell, none of them had been tested in actual gameplay. It seemed more like the author noodling around seeing how strange he could be.Of course tastes differ, and there are almost certainly people who would read about playing chess on a fractal board or one constructed of lissajou curves and think "That sounds awesome!", but I'm not one of them. And I wasn't scared off by the math; I'm a math professor. It just seemed that the games were more an exercise in invention than anything anyone would actually want to play.EDIT: After reading some more I raised my rating from one star to three. He does have some interesting ideas about movement rules that are a bit more like what I was expecting. I liked the one where if you made a capture you could continue your move if the piece could make another capture, like multiple jumps in checkers. But I still didn't see any evidence that any of this had actually been tested. He kept introducing variants with the phrase "How would it be if...?" It was like he was throwing stuff at the wall to see if anything would stick.

Alot of the variants featured with different shaped boards are okay, but you'd have to make all these different shaped boards yourself. The others on regular 8X8 boards are good but some of the explanations on rules and how to play are not always clear or easy to understand. Not bad though if you don't want to buy Pritchard's Encylo of Variants whic here at Amazon is $300+ for a used copy!

very interesting : very much curious variants and mathematic positionnals variants.But it is necesssarly to be an expert mathematician:)

This book explores numerous theoretical, particularly geometrical, variants of chess. One cannot fail to be impressed by the systematic effort the author has exerted and the games community should be grateful that someone with mathematical expertise has gone to the trouble of undertaking an investigation based upon first principles. The scope extends beyond chess variants to include chess inspired puzzles, chess inspired games, team chess, outdoor chess, and even sports inspired games. The chapter I was interested in was chess in education.Assuming that the author has done his best to devise suitable games, it is chastening to discover that very few if any will have any practical application. This is not to express any disappointment at the authorship, but to reflect that mankind has extracted the greatest benefit from chess already and tweaking it further brings little educational gain. Having said that, there are chess variants with an enthusiastic following (e.g. losers chess) which are given only scant attention. It would be easier to check the ideas in the book if there were an index.If I have one criticism of the content it is that the author is not bothered by whether any of these variants would be attractive to games players. He fails to distinguish the playable variants from those which are purely whimsical: amusing to contemplate for a few moments, but clearly unsuitable for ordinary mortals. This is a pity because there was some opportunity to provide such insights and the reader would expect more on this aspect.The content is so detached that there is not one chess diagram, which must be regarded as singularly unusual for a book with the title Chess Variants and Games. Perhaps the clue lies in the subtitle: For Intellectual Development and Amusement. The emphasis on the intellectual and amusement aspects is at the expense of the game-playing and problem-solving potential.This book is suitable for someone interested in developing new games who is looking for some new ideas. However, there is still plenty of work to do before we find another playable variant.

I just received a review copy of Chess Variants and Games today and it was not at all what I expected but found it interesting. AV Murali, the author, an Indian software engineer and a man with a deep interest in mathematics and logic, lovingly offers a staggering collation of variants of chess--every possible version of chess but chess itself! I didn't count, but it looks like there are over 1000 possibilities. There are circular versions, cylindrical version, versions with partitions, order to chaos version, and of course versions where the pieces take on strange powers and shapes. You name it, and I will bet you a quarter it is in the book. A simple variant which greatly enhances the complexity level is to play a normal chess game but with two boards. So instead of 8 ranks and files, we get 16! Clearly, this book is an acquired taste. For those of you who enjoy Fisher Random chess or if you are a teacher, especially of very young children, this book is for you. I can see how teaching a child so many possible variants would clearly enhance mathematical and logic abilities. For a math-challenged guy like me, chess is hard enough without adding new and confusing rules, yet I see a market for teachers, mathophiles and logic enthusiasts who would find this book interesting.