PokerChess - game my friend invented (soon to be kickstarted)

PokerChess is a game a friend of mine invented.  It's launching a kickstarter soon.

It's basically what it sounds like - a combination of Poker and Chess.  Each card in a normal deck of cards corresponds to a chess piece.  

Cards that aren't face cards count as pawns. 

On your turn you can either raise the bet, draw a card, or move a piece.  There's also a betting round before the 'combat' starts.  

Here's a link to a video introducing the game: 

And a video with the rules:

And finally here is a sample round that could occur (although the chances that you will ever end up in this exact situation are very , very small  ) 

I think this game is absolutely fascinating, and I don't think you necessarily have to be good at chess to win at the game!

You can see (in the above video) that black checkmated white, but actually lost the round because white had a stronger hand. (Checkmate ends the round and whoever has the highest poker hand, including cards on the board, wins).

How could black have played better, if he knew that white had such a strong hand?  

Well, he could have tried to get the guaranteed victory by marching his king to the "crown" square, which guarantees victory. Of course, it takes a while to get your king there, and white could have been drawing cards, or placing pieces to prevent him from getting there.  However, with such powerful cards on the board, like a queen, black could have tried to attack these pieces, or maybe even captured the pieces that composed white's full house if he placed them!

You can see that the strategical implications of this game are actually quite deep, and the combination of chess strategy, bluffing, and random chance all come into play.  Because of the hidden information element, and the bluffing element, you can expect to win a certain percentage of the time even if you are not skilled, unlike chess, where if you are a grandmaster, you're pretty much always going to beat a beginner.

If you're interested in the game, you can get more info at http://www.pokerchess.com  , where you can get more info or sign up to an email list to be notified when the kickstarter goes live, and get your own set.

Another interesting aspect of this game is the angle that humans will be able to beat computers.  There are a huge number of starting positions as you can see in the video, and the game involves hidden information, as well as bluffing and chess strategy. 

It will be interesting to see if this is the game humans stay dominant at

Best wishes and healthy holidays

Cool