Patent Pending · Only on Super Chess 16x16
reprogram every piece on The board. Or reprogram all the pieces for both players equally. Or even reprogram each on each side individually and in secret, thus your opponent will never know how your pieces move.
Every other chess game ever made gives you the same six pieces. Same Rook, same Knight, same rules your great-great-grandfather played by. Super Chess 16x16 lets you reprogram every one of your pieces — King, Queen, Rook, Bishop, Knight, Super Pawn, Prince, Princess, Archbishop, Super Knight, Fortress — by clicking squares on the board. Your opponent does the same with theirs. The match becomes a contest of two custom movement repertoires.
What does "reprogrammable" actually mean?
On every Super Chess 16x16 board, before or during a match, you can pick any of your own pieces — King, Queen, Rook, Bishop, Knight, Super Pawn, Prince, Princess, Archbishop, Super Knight, Fortress — and add or remove movement vectors from its legal-move list. Click a square relative to the piece and that vector becomes a legal move for that piece type from then on. Right-click to take a vector back.
For each piece you also flip three behaviour switches: slide (the piece travels along its vector until it hits the edge or another piece, like a Rook), jump (the piece leaps over anything in the way, like a Knight), or step (the piece moves the exact offset only, like a King). Pick whichever combination matches the strategy you want.
Three game modes you pick when the match is created
- Default mode. No reprogramming. Every piece uses the standard Super Chess 16x16 rules. Use this when both players want a clean, no-surprises game.
- Each side programs their own pieces — private. Asymmetric mode. Both players reprogram their rosters independently before the match. Only YOU know where your pieces can move; your opponent's repertoire is hidden from you and yours is hidden from them. The board reveals each move when it happens, but the full move list of the opposite side is never shown. Your repertoire becomes a hidden-information weapon.
- Both sides use the same reprogrammed pieces — symmetric. The two players agree on ONE custom roster. Whatever vectors you add to the King apply to BOTH Kings; whatever you change about the Knight applies to BOTH Knights. The game stays balanced and plays on a board nobody has ever seen.
Default mode is always one click away. Pick it and the match drops back to standard Super Chess 16x16 rules — nothing about the reprogramming feature is permanent.
How it works, step by step
- Pick the piece type you want to reprogram. Click any of your pieces in the editor; the board lights up the squares its current move list reaches.
- Click any square on the board. That square's offset (e.g., "two right, one up") is added to the piece type's permanent move list. From that moment on, every one of your pieces of that type can travel that exact relative jump.
- Repeat as much as you want. Click "two squares forward" to make a Pawn that walks like a Rook. Click eight wild squares on your King to give it a long-range escape. Click an extra knight-jump on your Bishop to confuse your opponent.
- Right-click a square to take that vector back if you change your mind.
- Save the entire reprogrammed roster to your account. Bring it back to your next game. Share it with friends.
Why this matters for chess players
Originality
You are not playing the same game everyone else has played since 1500. Every match is a brand-new variant designed by the two players who agreed to it.
Tactics no opening book covers
Stockfish cannot help your opponent if their opening repertoire assumes a standard Knight and you handed them one that slides like a Bishop. Every prep sheet on Earth is a partial answer at best.
Real strategic depth
Adding power to a piece is easy; balancing your roster is hard. A King with too many escape squares becomes hard to checkmate but the rest of your pieces lose tempo. Designing the right repertoire is its own skill.
Educational value
Reprogramming pieces teaches you what every chess piece is, mathematically: a list of (row, column) offsets. You will never look at a Knight the same way again.
Endless replayability
Every match has the potential to be a new variant. Same engine, infinite chess.
A real conversation piece
Beat a friend with a Bishop you taught to jump like a Knight, then beat them again with a King that teleports five squares. Tell us that doesn't make for memorable games.
Things you can do with reprogramming
- Recreate any classic piece.
A Knight is just
[1,2] [-1,2] [1,-2] [-1,-2] [2,1] [-2,1] [2,-1] [-2,-1]— eight clicks and you have it. Use the same trick to give a different piece type the same movement. - Invent a "long-range Knight" that jumps 3-1 instead of 2-1. Watch it dance over the new 16x16 ranks in ways an orthodox Knight never could.
- Build a "guard piece" that only moves one square in any direction — useful park-next-to-the-King defense.
- Combine two pieces' movement into one. Want your Rook to also move diagonally? Add the diagonal vectors. Want your Bishop to also move orthogonally? Same trick.
- Make a one-trick piece with a single huge jump (say, "five squares forward, three squares right") that lurks on the board until exactly the right moment.
- Save and reuse your favourite designs. Build a library of piece designs in your account, and pick the right roster for the time control or opponent.
- Compete. Tournaments where every player reprograms their roster BEFORE the game starts produce some of the wildest chess you will ever see.
Frequently asked
Does this break the game balance?
Yes — intentionally. Super Chess 16x16 is a chess variant; balance comes from the fact that BOTH players reprogram their rosters. If you build a monster Bishop, your opponent builds something equally weird. The skill is in designing a roster that is more useful than your opponent's, not just stronger.
Can I bring my custom roster into a rated game?
Yes, against opponents who agree. Some tournaments require all entrants to declare their rosters in advance; some allow on-the-fly reprogramming during play; some forbid reprogramming entirely so the variant plays as standard Super Chess 16x16. Your call per match.
Does the engine actually validate reprogrammed moves?
Yes. Super Chess 16x16 uses a single data-driven move- generation engine that consumes piece definitions as data. Whether the piece is a King moving one square or a King you reprogrammed to teleport, the same code path decides which moves are legal. No piece is special-cased. (This is what is patented.)
What stops someone from cheating with absurd movement?
The server validates every move against the piece definitions recorded for that game at the moment it started, so neither player can quietly extend a piece's powers mid-game. Hidden does NOT mean unverified — it means your opponent does not see your move list, not that nobody does. In symmetric mode, both players see the same shared roster; in default mode, both players see the standard rules; in asymmetric (private) mode, each player sees only their own roster but the server enforces both rosters strictly.
Is this really patented?
U.S. Provisional Patent Application has been filed at the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) for the data-driven piece-movement engine and the runtime authoring subsystem. Once you have an account, every game you play with a reprogrammed piece exercises that protected technology.
How do I try it?
Right now, today: play it free in your browser or sign up free. The Android app is coming soon to Google Play.
Ready to redesign chess?
It costs nothing. It takes thirty seconds per piece. It changes how you look at chess forever.