Battle Chess

Battle Chess is a chess video game where pieces come to life as animated figures. When one piece captures another, a unique battle animation plays showing the attacker defeating the defender. There are 35 different battle animations, one for each piece-vs-piece permutation. The rook turns into a rock monster to smash a pawn, and the rook eats the queen. Some animations pay homage to pop culture: the knight vs. knight battle references Monty Python and the Holy Grail, while the king vs. bishop pastiches Indiana Jones defeating a swordsman. The game includes an opening library of 30,000 moves and 10 skill levels. Players may also switch to a traditional 2D view without animations. Two-player modes include hotseat, null modem, or network play .

3DO

Released in 1993 in North America and Europe, and on September 16, 1994 in Japan . Published by Interplay, this version is based on the 1991 PC "Enhanced Edition" . Graphics are notably improved over the original Amiga version, featuring better color depth and CD-quality audio for the first time in the series . User reviews praise the 3DO port as "the best version of Battle Chess to buy on any home console" with superior graphics even to the PC original . The game preserves all 10 difficulty levels, the 30,000-move opening library, and all battle animations. Despite the visual upgrade, the animations remain slow—a half-minute per capture—making matches considerably longer than standard chess . Controls support gamepad, joystick, or mouse .