Title: Chessarama
Developer: Minimol Games
Publisher: Minimol Games, Hawthorn Games
Release Date: December 5, 2023
Reviewed on: PC via Steam
Price: $14.99 USD

The Background

Since the height of the pandemic, chess—a game clocking in at a spry 1,500 years or so—has seen a massive resurgence in play, from adults looking to learn a game that might have eluded them in their younger years, to children looking for games easily replicated in both online and physical spaces. Nestled in between the old and the new, Minimol Games—under the direction of Game Director, Raphael Dias da Silva—introduces a cozy and deceptively easy avenue for players of the game, old and new, to revisit the rules and fundamentals of chess. Now an official sponsor of world’s top online chess tournament, Play Magnus Group’s flagship Champions Chess Tour, Chessarama will also be sponsoring chess24’s coverage of the FIDE World Championship cycle.

The Gameplay

From the onset of the main menu, the navigation and graphics of Chessarama sports an interface that would be easy enough for an elementary school student to use while not being frustrating to the average adult user. The game is smooth, with clear graphics and plenty of negative space that allows for the creative “chessboards” to become the focal point for the player. In a delightful series, each load screen also sports a chess related quote from a great chess master, lighting up the screen with pithy wisdom from Kasparov to Bobby Fisher. During gameplay, the ability to turn the camera also allows for newer players to visual the ways in which they need to move their pieces to satisfy the target of each level, which give a certain amount of XP when accomplished. When enough XP is gathered, the players are able to acquire unique chess pieces, allowing them to customize their board with delightfully cute bishops, knights, kings and queens.

After the tutorial, players progress through a series of learning worlds that follow a specific theme. For the first, the players are taken to a farm where they learn the basic moves and abilities of a specific chess piece. Using the real life rules of these pieces and focusing only on one allows the player to truly understand the capabilities of each piece before moving on to the next. Given a series of simple tasks (moving the piece across the board to “cultivate” a plot of farmland, moving the piece across the board only once to keep said farmland green, moving the piece to every unoccupied plot of farmland) the player quickly understands what the piece can do on a chessboard given its individual limitations.

Once that is done with, the player moves onto more difficult combinations of puzzles to solve and more pieces to learn. Each level has a different theme from the soccer field to feudal Japan to a fantasy world replete with knights and dragons. As the player progresses, the board begins to resemble a classic chessboard more and more, with various achievements being unlocked as gameplay and difficulty progresses. Knowledge set up in previous levels is expanded upon, teaching the player combinations of moves available to them, while emphasizing the need to look “two moves ahead,” an invaluable skill in a standard game of chess. Longtime chess players will enjoy the ways in which Chessarama requires them to think outside of the regular rules of play to complete the puzzles with the allotted moves and level objectives.

The Verdict

The Good: As a lifelong chess player, I found Chessarama to be a delightful departure from the ways that chess is traditionally taught. The music was pleasant and unobtrusive, making for a nice background to be drowned out as gameplay progressed. The graphics were simple but not simplistic, and I found myself wanting to achieve the extra goals on each level to gain new pieces. The addition of gaming skins to the game of chess is not what I anticipated enjoying but can easily see how any younger players might be motivated to move through the puzzles for this sense of achievement.

My Wishlist: I was pleased with the accessibility features in the game and their ease of use, the font choices and the size of the interface made it simply to turn off and on functions that I did not want activated during gameplay, but would love to see more to bring this game to even more settings, such as the classroom. The camera sensitivity was one such feature that I had to modify as I found myself accidentally spinning the board in a full 360° at several places in gameplay. I do wish that there was an online feature to allow players to eventually play with each other, but I can easily see how that may become a feature down the road, as well as the addition of new worlds of play.

Final Thoughts: More than anything, a very obvious ethic of care flows through the simple and beautiful progression of the game from start to finish. Teaching players to think individually before expanding their world view onto the whole board and its capabilities, Chessarama is a testament to Minimol Games’ shared love of the game.

Featured Image: Minimol Games

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