''Chess Titans'' is a chess video game with 3D graphics developed by Oberon Games and included in

Windows Vista Windows Vista is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was the direct successor to Windows XP, released five years earlier, which was then the longest time span between successive releases of Microsoft W ...

and

Windows 7 Windows 7 is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was Software release life cycle#Release to manufacturing (RTM), released to manufacturing on July 22, 2009, and became generally available on October 22, ...

Home Premium, Professional, Enterprise, and Ultimate. It is a fully 3D animated,

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interactive

chess Chess is a board game for two players. It is an abstract strategy game that involves Perfect information, no hidden information and no elements of game of chance, chance. It is played on a square chessboard, board consisting of 64 squares arran ...

game with ten difficulty levels when played against the computer. It can be played by two participants, or one player against the computer.

History

The game was publicly introduced in Windows Vista build 5219. Another chess program by Microsoft known simply as ''Chess'' was bundled in Microsoft Entertainment Pack 4 for earlier versions of Windows in 1992. It was developed by David Norris, a former Microsoft employee and author of the chess engine "Ziggurat".

Graphics

The game is fully animated and designed for demonstrating the hardware-accelerated graphics capabilities of the earlier

Windows Presentation Foundation Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) is a free and open-source user interface framework for Windows-based desktop applications. WPF applications are based in .NET, and are primarily developed using C# and XAML. Originally developed by Microso ...

in Windows Vista. The game features a

board which can be rotated in 3D, and themes are available for the chess pieces and board. The game showcases the 3D capabilities of Vista on the desktop.

Gameplay

The game can be played with either a

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and a keyboard or any

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controller for

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. It can also be played through

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, using the remote control provided with TV Tuner Cards, and certain laptops as well. On each player's turn, ''Chess Titans'' displays the last move made by the opponent. The player can also click on a chess piece to highlight all valid moves for that piece. These features can be turned off in the Options dialog box.

Player vs. computer

* ''Chess Titans'' has ten difficulty levels, which can be selected from the Options dialog box. The player can also choose whether to play as black or white. When playing against the computer for the first time, the player is prompted to choose an initial difficulty level of Beginner (level 2), Intermediate (level 5), or Advanced (level 8). ''Chess Titans'' keeps a record of how many games the player has won, drawn, and lost against the computer at each difficulty level. The statistics can be reset, however, it does not calculate Elo numbers or, since the player can play against the computer, approximations thereof.

Player vs. player

In a two-player game, the chess board automatically turns 180 degrees for the opposite player after each move. This option can be turned off. ''Chess Titans'' saves all two-player game scores.

References