Chess 3D

Chess 3D is ordinary chess presented on a three-dimensional board. The rules are the ones that have been fixed since the fifteenth century: the same six pieces, the same board, castling, en passant, promotion and stalemate all behave exactly as they should. The only thing the 3D presentation changes is the camera angle, and that is worth more than it sounds. Seeing the pieces at an angle rather than flat from above makes the difference between a bishop and a pawn obvious at a glance, which matters when you are playing quickly. Nothing about the game is dressed up beyond that. There is no energy meter, no currency and no timer forcing you to hurry. If you want chess and only chess, that is what this is.

White moves first and the two sides alternate until one king is checkmated, a draw is agreed, or the position repeats. Click a piece to select it, then click the square you want it on. The goal is not to capture as much material as possible but to trap the opposing king so that every square it could move to is attacked and no piece can block or capture the attacker. A king that cannot legally move but is not currently in check is stalemate, which is a draw — a distinction that costs beginners more won games than any other rule.

Control the four central squares early. A knight on the rim genuinely does have fewer moves available to it, and that is not folklore but arithmetic. Develop your minor pieces before moving the same piece twice, and castle early rather than leaving the king in the middle where both files can open against it. When you cannot find a plan, improve the position of your worst-placed piece; it is almost always a better use of a move than a speculative attack. And before every single move, check what your opponent's last move threatened. Most losses at club level are not clever combinations by the other side, they are unanswered one-move threats.