Pure Chess

Pure Chess is a Board Game developed by VooFoo Studios for the Nintendo 3DS and was released on March 20, 2014. Sticking to the classic formula, the game layers on essential ingredients for the modern age, shrinking down the experience into a portable beauty. There’s the archetypal Staunton set, as well as Williams and Chequers variants, and the environments are equally pleasing, with opulent locales such as a museum, penthouse, and library. Of course, the game is what’s important and Pure Chess is a friend to both tenderfoots and champions.

There are three tournament modes and a hundred bonus puzzles to test the grey matter, including half-played set-ups that require checkmates within a certain number of moves. Assuming you’re not the next Garry Kasparov – or Deep Blue! – you’ll be thankful for step-by-step tutorials that start with elementary steps, before progressing to intermediate and advanced game tactics. Competing with a computer is one thing but the supreme challenge is besting a human opponent, and Pure Chess has all the angles covered. Not only can you go head-to-head with other Nintendo 3DS gamers but you can play against Wii U users, too.

Break off between turns or wait while your opponent makes a move for a ‘live’ feel. Moreover, you can play up to six games simultaneously, dipping in and out of each at your leisure – certainly, some matches will require the long game, where the inspiration for a winning move might strike at the most unlikely time. Elsewhere, the leaderboards keep track of tournament progress and your ELO rating, the official method for calculating your skill, relative to other players. The higher the rating, the greater your potential game but the more you risk losing, should you fall to a lower-level player.