Chess

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is about the Western board game. For other chess games or other uses, see Chess
(disambiguation).

Chess

Part of a Staunton chess set (left to right): white king, black rook,

black queen, white pawn, black knight, white bishop

Years active c. 6th-century India to present

Genre(s) Mind sport

Board game

Abstract strategy game

Players 2

Setup time 1 minute

Playing time Casual games usually last 10 to 60 minutes;

tournament games last anywhere from about ten

minutes (fast chess) to six hours or more.

Random None

chance
 Skill(s) Strategy, tactics

required

Chess is a two-player strategy board game played on a chessboard, a checkered gameboard with
64 squares arranged in an eight-by-eight grid.[1] Chess is played by millions of people worldwide,
both amateurs and professionals.
Each player begins the game with 16 pieces: one king, one queen, two rooks, two knights,
two bishops, and eight pawns. Each of the six piece types moves differently, with the most powerful
being the queen and the least powerful the pawn. The objective is to 'checkmate'[2] the opponent's
king by placing it under an inescapable threat of capture. To this end, a player's pieces are used to
attack and capture the opponent's pieces, while supporting their own. In addition to checkmate, the
game can be won by voluntary resignation by the opponent, which typically occurs when too
much material is lost, or if checkmate appears unavoidable. A game may also result in a draw in
several ways.
Chess is believed to have originated in India, some time before the 7th century, being derived from
the Indian game of chaturanga. Chaturanga is also the likely ancestor of the Eastern strategy
games xiangqi, janggi and shogi. The pieces took on their current powers in Spain in the late 15th
century; the rules were finally standardized in the 19th century. The first generally recognized World
Chess Champion, Wilhelm Steinitz, claimed his title in 1886. Since 1948, the World Championship
has been controlled by FIDE, the game's international governing body; the current World Champion
is the Norwegian Magnus Carlsen. FIDE also organizes the Women's World Championship,
the World Junior Championship, the World Senior Championship, the Blitz and Rapid World
Championships and the Chess Olympiad, a popular competition among teams from different nations.
There is also a Correspondence Chess World Championship and a World Computer Chess
Championship. Online chess has opened amateur and professional competition to a wide and varied
group of players. There are also many chess variants, with different rules, different pieces, and
different boards.
FIDE awards titles to skilled players, the highest of which is grandmaster. Many national chess
organizations also have a title system. However, these are not recognised by FIDE. The term
"master" may refer to a formal title or may be used more loosely for any skilled player.
Until recently, chess was a recognized sport of the International Olympic Committee;[3] some national
sporting bodies such as the Spanish Consejo Superior de Deportes also recognize chess as a sport.
[4]
Chess was included in the 2006 and 2010 Asian Games.
Since the second half of the 20th century, computers have been programmed to play chess with
increasing success, to the point where the strongest home computers play chess at a higher level
than the best human players. Since the 1990s, computer analysis has contributed significantly to
chess theory, particularly in the endgame. The computer IBM Deep Blue was the first machine to
overcome a reigning World Chess Champion in a match when it defeated Garry Kasparov in 1997.
The rise of strong computer programs (known as "engines") that can be run on hand-held devices
has led to increasing concerns about cheating during tournaments.