Brief Introduction to Chess
Chess is an exciting board game. One mistake may decide the match. When you play chess you will experience lots of emotions and you will learn problem solving, strategic thinking, and more!
How to Play Chess
Do you know how to play chess? Chess is one of the oldest and most popular board games played by two opponents on a board with 64 squares and 32 chess pieces. The chess board is arranged in eight vertical rows called files and eight horizontal rows called ranks. These squares alternate between two colors, one dark color and one light color, usually white and black but can also be other colors. The pieces include the king, queen, rook, knight, bishop and pawn.
The king is the most important chess piece. The king can move to any square that’s next to it. The queen is the most powerful piece in chess. The queen can move as far as it wants in each direction. The only thing the queen can’t do is that it cannot jump over pieces when it moves.
The rook is the second most powerful piece. It has the same moves as the queen but it cannot move diagonally. The next most powerful piece is the bishop. It can move diagonally, but not forward, backwards or sideways. The next most powerful piece is the knight. The knight is the only piece that doesn’t go in a straight line, and the only piece that can jump over pieces. The knight moves two squares in one direction, then it turns and goes one in another direction. The knight and the bishop both have about the same amount of strength, but one can be better than each other in certain positions.
Pawns are the least powerful piece. Typically, pawns move one square forward on each move. Pawns can capture a piece that is one square diagonally ahead. On the first move you can advance the pawn one or two squares forward. You can also promote your pawn when your pawn reaches the end of the board. When it promotes you can choose which piece to replace the pawn. You could choose a knight, bishop, rook or queen, but you can’t promote to a king.
There are eight pawns, two rooks, two knights, two bishops, one queen and one king on each side.
Did you know that chess pieces are given a value?
Queen = 9 points
Rook = 5 points
Bishop = 3 points
Knight = 3 points
Pawn = 1 point
In chess each piece is given a number to what might be believed as their best estimated value. These values may help determine who might be winning or losing in a game. You may notice the king doesn’t have a value. If the king gets checkmated, you lose the game.
How to Win
Since you know how to set up a chess board and how to move the chess pieces, you might be wondering how to win. When you start playing you are either white or black. White moves first. After white moves, black moves. After that they take turns to move the pieces they want. There are three ways to win - by resignation, checkmate, or by winning on time. You could resign when you are losing pretty badly and you don’t want to play on.
Checkmate is a game position in chess when the king is in check and there is no way to get out of check. A check is a condition when a player’s king is under threat of capture on their opponent's turn. A player must get out of check, the player could interpose a piece between the threatening piece and the king, capture the threatening piece, or move the king to a square where it is no longer in check; And if the player cannot move out of check, the game ends in checkmate.
You can win on time, in games under time control. Also some games can be a draw. A draw is a tie. You can draw by agreement, stalemate, threefold repetition, fifty-move rule, dead position and draw on time.
There are three phases of the game, the opening, where controlling the center and piece development is predominant; and the middle game where you attack and defend and create a plan to win. Weaknesses also occur in the middle game. The last phase is the endgame, where, generally after several piece exchanges, pawn promotion becomes the most dominant theme. When you start playing a chess game, you want to develop your pieces and control the center. The center squares are e4, e5, d5, and d4. A popular move for white is e4 controlling the center. Though, white can play other moves too. You might even try to play a gambit. A gambit is a chess opening which a player sacrifices material with the aim of a positional advantage. Black can defend e4 with e5. And if you are confused on what e4 or d5 is, it’s algebraic notation. After black plays e5, white should try to develop your knights then your bishops. Nf3 attacking e5 is a good move for this position, but there are alternatives such as Nc3. Since white is attacking e5, a good move for black is Nc6. After developing your knights you want to move your bishops to active squares.
After you develop, make a plan to win! You also have to defend, not only attack. In a typical game, after trading some pieces and trying to attack, it becomes the endgame. In the endgame, promoting your pawns is the most dominant theme, so it’s a good idea to promote your pawns. Sometimes though, the game may end in the middle game or even in the opening.
Origin
Have you ever wondered where chess originated? Chess originated somewhere about 1500 years ago. According to Wikipedia, “the history of chess can be traced back to nearly 1500 years, although the earliest origins are uncertain. The earliest predecessor of the game probably originated in India, by the 7th century AD.” After the Arabs conquered Persia, chess was taken by the Muslim world and spread to Southern Europe afterward.
Chess evolved roughly in its current form from the 15th century in Europe. In the 15th century to the 1880s, “Romantic chess” was the predominant chess playing style. The chess games of this period were more on quick, tactical maneuvers rather than long term strategic planning. After the Romantic era it was followed by the Scientific, Hypermodern and New Dynamism eras. The first official World Chess Championship was held in 1886. In the 20th century chess saw a great leap in chess theory and the establishment of the World Chess Federation.
Famous Chess Players and Rating
Have you ever wondered about famous chess players and ratings? Rating is a system used in chess to estimate the strength of a player. It is based on their performance versus other players. It is used by organizations such as FIDE (Fee-day), the US Chess Federation (USCF or US Chess), International Correspondence Chess Federation, and the English Chess Federation. Most of the systems recalculate ratings after a tournament or match, but some are used to recalculate ratings after individual games.
Online popular chess sites like chess.com, Lichess, and Internet Chess Club implement rating systems. In almost all systems the higher number indicates a stronger player. Players ratings go up if they perform better than expected and down if they perform worse than expected. The most widely used rating system is the Elo rating system.
Did you also know that there are titles in chess? They are awarded to the best players by the world chess organization FIDE. Titles include Grandmaster, International Master, FIDE Master and Candidate Master. Grandmaster is GM for short, International Master is IM for short, FIDE Master is shortened as FM, and Candidate Master is CM for short. All the titles are open to men and women. There are several women-only titles, such as Women Grandmaster (WGM).
Famous chess players have titles. Some famous chess players include Garry Kasparov, Magnus Carlsen, Bobby Fischer, and Jose Raul Capablanca. There are famous women chess players too! Just to name a few, Judit Polgar, Hou Yifan, Alexandra Kosteniuk, Alisa Galiamova and Anna Muzychuck. Have you also attended a tournament to receive your rating?
I hope you learned about chess. Some things you learned were about making a plan, how to play chess, how to checkmate and famous chess players and rating. Chess is an exciting, strategic, and problem solving game. If you are interested in chess, you should start playing chess if you haven’t.
