Video Game / Battle Chess

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Battle Chess is a video game version of Chess produced by Interplay Entertainment. The first version of the game was released for the Amiga in 1988, and it was ported to many other home computers of the time, with versions popping up on the 3DO Interactive Multiplayer, Acorn Archimedes, Amiga CD32, Amiga CDTV, Apple IIGS, Apple ][, Atari ST, Commodore 64, MS-DOS, FM Towns, Nintendo Entertainment System, macOS, PC-98, Sharp X68000, and Microsoft Windows.

In most respects, it is an ordinary chess program, not even as smart as most PC chess programs of the time. But it is different in one way: The chess pieces are all animated, and every time a piece was moved, you can see an animation. Every time there is a capture, the capturing piece fights a little battle with the captured piece on the board. Since the rules of chess are still in effect, the result of these battles is always a Foregone Conclusion, but the battles are fun to watch, especially on early plays (watching the same animation for the millionth time, however...) Interestingly, unlike other chess programs, the game ends with the checkmating piece actually capturing the enemy king, not just threatening to do so.

In other words, it's basically a chess game that plays like Holochess or Wizard's Chess. American versions of the game did include gorier battles.

In 1991 Interplay released Battle Chess Enhanced, a remastered version of the original game with improved graphics, music played from the CD-ROM and a tutorial on the rules of chess narrated by the pieces themselves. The game has also spawned a small franchise with three sequels:

• First up was ​Battle Chess II: Chinese Chess, released in 1990. It's a Battle Chess-styled adaptation of the game of Xiangqi, also known as "Chinese Chess" in the West.
• Battle Chess 4000, released in 1992, uses a sci-fi theme and a claymation-esque art style.
• Most recently the game received a full Video Game Remake titled Battle Chess: Game of Kings in 2015. It adds features such as multiple animations for the captures, different graphical options for the pieces and board, online multiplayer and a Combat Vault where players can view the capture animations.

Tropes:

• Adaptational Badass: The Rook, in the original board game, is a watchtower of some kind. In Battle Chess, it transforms into a rock monster when moving and fighting.
• Agony of the Feet: In the original Pawn vs Pawn.
• Amusing Injuries / Bloody Hilarious: Contributes to the Black Comedy in Battle Chess and goes into downright slapstick territory in Chinese Chess.
• Armor Is Useless: Knights are often on the receiving end of this - sword thrusts effortlessly penetrating their breastplates is a common result of battles in Game of Kings. In fact, one of the scenes for a Pawn beating a Knight has him dying because the Pawn trips as they charge into each other to fight, causing him to fall and get impaled by one of his swords.
• Artificial Stupidity: The AI isn't the sharpest to ever appear in the chess game. It's arguably worse in the NES port, where it's so adamant on never losing any pieces that putting so much as an enemy pawn in position to be captured will cause the CPU to lock up while it tries to think of a way out of the predicament.
• Aside Glance:
  • When a Queen attacks a Pawn, she uses her magic to make his spear vanish. The Pawn briefly looks at the player in response, as if to say: "What the hell?!"
  • In the enhanced version, when two Knights face each other, after the attacking Knight manages to reduce his opponent to only one leg, he shrugs at the player.
  • When a King attacks a Knight, the Knight briefly glances at the player when the King pulls out a bomb.
  • When a Rook attacks a Knight, the Knight once again stares at the player with audible dread after realizing his sword had absolutely no effect on the Rook.
• Attack Reflector: The Knight defeats the Queen by bouncing her transformation magic back at her with his shield. The Pawn also does it in the enhanced version by reflecting her magic blast with his spear.
• Ax-Crazy: In the tutorial, the Rook loves talking about smashing things. And while talking about castling, "I'm only going to go through it ONCE. If you don't understand, I'll smash YOU!"
• Beam-O-War: Queen vs Bishop can result in a magic version of this in Game of Kings.
• Berserk Button: Don't try to seduce the King if you don't mean it. And never taunt or insult the Pawn.
  King: What?! You wench!
• Bloodier and Gorier: The American version.
• Bring It: Done by the Rook to the King in Game of Kings.
• Catch and Return: Bishops can kill Pawns like this in Game of Kings with the Pawn throwing a dagger at the Bishop who catches it with magic, then throws it back at the offender. The Pawn gets to block it in one of his battle cutscenes, however.
• Censor Decoy: A really funny and non-offensive variation by the artist who drew the Queen. He knew he was working with meddlesome executives, and he also knew exactly what he wanted the Queen to look like, how she should move, etc. So he drew her animations exactly like he wanted... And then added a pet duck that made no sense in the context. The executive told him it looked great except the duck had to go, and he ended up with exactly the original design.
• Combat Pragmatist:
  • The King. While every other piece sticks to a general technique they'll use - the Pawn's spear and Bishop's crozier, the Rook's sheer brute force (he turns into a rock monster to move and attack), the Knight's sword and shield and the Queen's magic - the King has a unique weapon for each piece he attacks: A hidden flail in his sceptre to take down Pawns, magic shrinking powder to remove Rooks, seduction of the Queen before clubbing her out, bombs to dispatch Knights, and freakin' guns to take out Bishops.
  • To an extent, the Pawn is this too, as he uses dirty tactics against his opponents. Against other Pawns, he stamps the butt of his spear on the opponent's foot, or takes advantage of the opposing Pawn's taunting to stab his stomach; against Knights, simply kicks or stabs him between the legs; against Bishops, he positions him over a hidden trapdoor; against Rooks, he uses a Groin Attack and then grinds him to pieces with the butt of his spear; against the Queen, he chucks a dagger into her back when she tries to walk away; when checkmating the King, he simply hoists the King's crown and takes it for his own. Considering he is very much outclassed compared to the other pieces, he sort of has to resort to this. Plus, as most of his victory animations on "Game of Kings" show, he tends to take advantage of his opponent underestimating him for being a Pawn and uses a mix of quick thinking, unconventional tactics, and a bit of dumb luck.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: Queen attacks any piece other than the King.
• Cutscene: The point of this game over other chess games of the era.
• Dance-Off: The Knight and the Queen can get into one in Game of Kings. if the Knight is the one that captures her.
• Defeat by Modesty: When a Knight checkmates a King, a sword slash causes his robe to fall off, leaving him completely naked and sheepishly covering himself. The Knight just laughs.
• Denser and Wackier: Battle Chess II: Chinese Chess versus Battle Chess. The animations are much more comedic than serious: For instance, Pawn vs. Pawn results in the attacking Pawn getting frustrated at the defending Pawn dodging all his attacks, simply throwing down his ge in a rage, and sucker-punching the defending Pawn with a mean right hook.
• Dual Wielding: Knights in Game of Kings wield a long sword in each hand.
• Eaten Alive: Several battle animations consist of this.
• Eating the Eye Candy: Pawn attacks Queen. She isn't flattered.
  Pawn: Whoo! I'll show YOU a royal good time.
• Enhanced Remake: Battle Chess Enhanced (which used the CD-ROM technology for better graphics and sound.) Interplay has released a remake on Steam.
• Eye Scream: One possible outcome of a Pawn vs Pawn battle in Game of Kings is one pawn throwing a dagger into the other pawn's eye.
• Family-Unfriendly Violence: Most players of a chess game would be families and/or members of a chess club, so many of Battle Chess' animations- the bishops getting Stripped to the Bone, the victims on the receiving end of the queen's magic, the Monty Python Shout-Out, or the bishop performing a Diagonal Cut on the king when checkmating- are surprisingly violent.
• The Fatalist: The Pawn in the tutorial. The way he sees it, we all come to the same fate in the end... We're all doomed.
• Fat Bastard: Rooks in Game of Kings are these, being large, girthy men with no shirts, slitted helmets and large stone hammers, and who aren't afraid of crushing or mangling any enemy piece they manage to take.
• Femme Fatale: As befitting the strongest piece in the game, the Queen is capable of fighting other pieces using her magic in the animations, and is an attractive woman as well.
• Flynning: The Bishop does this quite a bit. Its practicality is averted when he's jumped by a King.
• Forced Transformation: The Queen has powers to do this. For instance, her checkmate involves turning the King into both a donkey and a frog. The queen attempts this when defending against the knight, only for it to be reflected and turning her into a dragon.
• Foregone Conclusion: Every battle cutscene.
• Gender Bender: As per the rules of chess, a Pawn who reaches the end of the board can turn into a queen. Which means that that ordinary, bearded infantryman will turn into a jawdroppingly gorgeous woman.
• Genius Bruiser: The Rook in its tutorial, not too dissimilar to the Hulk, right down to a penchant for smashing. The Rook in "Game Of Kings" appears to be this when it comes to his own animations, using different methods at times to defeat enemy pieces instead of relying sorely on his strength.
• Good Old Fisticuffs: Two knights in Game of Kings might agree to this method of resolving a battle, throwing down their swords and putting up their dukes. Two rooks can also do this, though in their case it's more of a Sumo Wrestling match.
• Groin Attack: When a Pawn attacks a Knight. It can also happen in "Game of Kings," if a Pawn is attacking a Rook. Not that he had any other options...
• Half the Man He Used to Be: The King's fate if checkmated by a Bishop, who uses his bladed crosier to slice him into three pieces.
• Handshake Substitute: In Game of Kings, during a castling move, the Rook and the King will exchange a Fist Bump as they walk past each other.
• Henpecked Husband: In the 3DO tutorial, the King makes a joke about the Queen nagging him and never letting him get any peace. The joke is he says that during his explanation of a chess strategy: While the King can capture a Queen, in practical terms he can never get close enough to threaten her. But the Queen can constantly harass him around the board. Around the end of her section of the tutorial, as the Queen explains the "Pawn Promotion/Queening" rule, she states that it may be all good for the King to have more than one Queen, but it REALLY TICKS HER OFF!
• High-Pressure Emotion: When one Pawn attacks another in the Enhanced version. Pawns may be a bit cowardly, but they do not like being insulted.
• Hoist by His Own Petard:
  • When attacked, the Queen's magical attack gets reflected by a Knight's shield.
  • Bishop vs. Bishop has an electrical attack made by the defender which is then reflected.
  • In Game of Kings, pieces often end up getting killed by their own weapons, either by accident or when another piece takes and uses them on them.
• Homage: When a Knight takes another Knight, they re-enact the famous scene with the Black Knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail.
• Hurt Foot Hop: When a Pawn captures an enemy Pawn, the former stomps the butt of his spear on the latter's foot, and after he hops around for a few seconds, gets stabbed through the visor.
• I'm a Humanitarian / Swallowed Whole: When a Rook attacks a Queen, he simply picks her up and eats her, then belches. The Bishop can also do the same to the Queen in Game of Kings.
  • Same for Chinese Chess, where it's the rook (which turns into a dragon) doing this to the knight, complete with spitting out his headband afterwards.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: In Game of Kings, the Bishop's weapon is a magic crosier with a butt spike, leading to this commonly being used both by then and against them (if their opponent takes their weapon). Similarly, both the Knight's and the Pawn's swords can be used for this.
• Klingon Promotion: When a Pawn checkmates a King; judging by how he looks around before actually going for that in the enhanced version, it's likely he was planning on it.
• Knightly Sword and Shield: In the original game, Knights have this combination of equipment. In Game of Kings, these are actually the weapons for Pawns, as the Knights switch to Dual Wielding swords.
• Lady of Black Magic: When a Queen attacks another piece, she lifts her arms and casts lightning magic on her victim.
• Literally Shattered Lives: Given Rook is made of stone, a few of his deaths involve this.
• Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: The Knight's shield is used to use the Queen's own powers against her.
• Ms. Fanservice: The Queen, especially in the later CD-ROM version of the game, has a rather voluptuous figure and does a Supermodel Strut when she moves.
• No One Could Survive That!: When a Pawn attacks a Bishop.
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: One of the outcomes for when a Rook attacks a Bishop in Game of Kings. The Bishop attempts to use his crosier's blinding light to stop the Rook from striking him, only for the Rook to drop his hammer, tackle him and pummel him to the ground.
• Neck Snap: The Knight can do this to the Queen in Game of Kings. Bishops can kill the Queen this way by levitating Force Snap.
• Offhand Backhand: Bishop checkmating King in Game of Kings after they levitate the crown off his head, the King charges at the Bishop only to run into the crosier and get impaled.
• Off with His Head!: The fate of a Bishop when captured by a Knight.
• Oh, Crap!: Any piece that, when attacked, has time to realize things are going pear-shaped.
• Pimped-Out Dress: Either on the package, or in the game, the Queen's dress is pimped out.
• Plotline Death: Well, insofar as chess has plotlines.
• Pretty in Mink: In most versions, the Queen's dress has a hem trimmed with ermine. On the packaging, her skimpy dress is edged with ermine on the cuffs, slit skirt, and cleavage.
• Rank Scales with Asskicking: The King, who has no problems going toe to toe with much younger and stronger characters. Game of Kings also gives him a much more muscular build than the original game.
• Religion Is Magic: The Bishop is the only one besides the Queen to display magical prowess.
• Requisite Royal Regalia: The queen and king have crowns and royal robes.
• Retractable Weapon: The Bishop's main weapon is a retractable blade built into his crosier. In combat, the king's scepter will extend slightly in order to become a flail when attacking an enemy pawn.
• Rock Monster: The Rooks. At rest they're just a stone tower, but they transform into a rock monster to move and attack.
• Royals Who Actually Do Something: The Queen, certainly, to the point she boasts about it in her part of the tutorial. The King, not so much (until the end game.)
  Queen: I don't just stare at myself in the mirror all day like those wimpy queens you read about in fairy tales...I'm a warrior queen.
• Screaming Woman: The Queen lets out a big scream that gets gradually muffled as she gets swallowed head-first by the Rook.
• Sexy Packaging: The Queen's dress is a lot skimpier in the packaging than in the game◊.
• Shockingly Expensive Bill: In the event that a Pawn takes the King, the Pawn withdraws a tax statement and shows it to the King; the King's eyes go wide, he clutches at his chest, and promptly dies from a heart-attack.
• Shout-Out:
  • The Knight vs. Knight animation homages the fight scene between King Arthur and the Black Knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, where the former hacks off the latter's limbs until he is rendered limbless.
  • When King captures the Bishop, the latter flourishes and spins his staff, before the former yawns and pulls out a gun to shoot him dead.
  • King vs. Queen references The Wild Wild West's opening credits sequence with the two making out at first. The Queen then pulls out a knife to stab the King, but the latter knocks her down with his scepter.
• Sinister Minister: The Bishop in Game of Kings is this, using such underhanded methods like poisoned chalices, sucking out souls and what amounts to a Force Choke.
• Spit Out a Shoe: The rook spits out the queen's tiara after swallowing her...and stomps it for good measure.
• Squashed Flat: The fate of the King when checkmated by a Rook. It even picks him up to show the player before dropping him with a noise of disgust, where he floats to the ground like a piece of paper.
• Stripped to the Bone: Queen vs Bishop ends with the Bishop reduced to a skeleton that collapses.
• Stout Strength: The Rook in Game of Kings.
• Supermodel Strut: The Queen moves in a slow strut while swaying her hips in a deliberately sensual manner.
• Surrender Backfire: When a Rook captures a Pawn, the Pawn, clearly realizing he's outmatched, drops his spear in the hopes that he'll be spared (and even tries to act all innocent and non-chalant afterwards, if it's the enhanced version), only for the Rook to smash him into the ground.
• Swallowed Whole: How Rook takes Queen. The Bishop in Game of Kings also turns the Queen's magic against her to shrink her down, picks her up and then eats her.
• Sword Cane: Carried by the King in Game of Kings.
• This Is Gonna Suck: In the enhanced version, when the Rook is the one to pull a checkmate, the King takes a moment to look at the player with a fearful whimper after he looks around and sees there is no one to defend him, not helped by the Rook's maniacal laughter as he corners him.
• Throwing Your Sword Always Works: In Game of Kings, the Knight can overcome the Bishop's reach advantage by throwing both swords through his chest. Bishops can also do this to Rooks by throwing the pointy end of their crosier.
• Too Dumb to Live: The Pawn, when attacked by a Rook, drops his spear and tries to surrender. The Rook promptly pummels him into the ground, likely offended by that. In Game of Kings he can accept wine from an enemy bishop which unsurprisingly turns out to be poisoned, or allow himself to be distracted by tossed gold coins thrown by an enemy king and then clubbed from behind.
• Visual Pun/Voluntary Shapeshifting: In one version, Queen takes Queen has them turning into cats and fighting to the death.
• Walking Head: The Rook vs Knight has the Rook smash the Knight into becoming one.
• Wins by Doing Absolutely Nothing: In Game of Kings, a Bishop may attack a Rook with his crozier only for the crozier to bounce off the Rook and knock the Bishop out, and a Rook attacking a King may pull off an impressive demonstration of weapon skill, only to suffer a heart attack from the exertion.
• Wrecked Weapon: A couple of the death animations involved the character being jumped having their weapon destroyed. The Pawn is particularly prone to this, with his spear being destroyed by both the Queen and the Knight.
• Wrestler in All of Us: In Game of Kings, two Knights that engage in Good Old Fisticuffs eventually ends in one finishing off the other with the People's Elbow.
• Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?: If the King attacks a Bishop, the King eventually does just that after growing bored with the Bishop's unsuccessful attempt at intimidating him with his staff-twirling.
• Would Hit a Girl: None of the pieces hesitate to take out the Queen given the opportunity, weapons or not.
• Your Soul Is Mine!: Bishops in Game of Kings can kill Pawns this way.

Battle Chess II: Chinese Chess contains examples of:

• Firebreather Backfire: A Pawn that captures a Chariot will plug up the dragon's snout with the dagger-hook on his spear, causing the dragon to balloon out comically before exploding.
• Forced Transformation/Visual Pun: When a Cannon blasts a Minister, the latter turns into an elephant before crumbling. This is a reference to the fact that the latter piece originated as a gajah, or elephant, and that on one side the pieces are labeled as elephants.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: When a Chariot jumps a Cannon, the dragonized charioteer simply redirects the cannonball at the cannon operator.
• Literally Shattered Lives: How the General dies if checkmated by a Cannon.
• Loud Gulp: The Minister when disarmed by the Knight. The Knight gets his turn when jumped by the General, who produces a sword FAN!
• No-Sell: Pretty much any piece takes Cannon or Chariot.
• Reduced to Dust: How a Pawn dies if jumped by a Cannon.
• Stout Strength: Ministers are rather rotund, and are strong enough to defeat charioteers in dragon form.
• Talk to the Fist: When one Pawn jumps another, the latter manages to No-Sell attacks even after being disarmed. The attacking Pawn casts his weapon aside and punches the other Pawn out.
• Voluntary Shapeshifting/Our Dragons Are Different: How Chariots fight.