Shogi-Themed Chess (Japanized Western Chess)

Kumuschiwa everyone! It has been a while since I last posted here and for today I would like to introduce my Japanized western chess. I call it the JI Shogi-Themed Chess.

*UPDATE: You can now play using this themed on Lichess. More information below.

Table of Contents

• Details
• Use JI Shogi-Themed on Lichess
• Shogi and Chess: Similarities and Differences

So without further ado, here is my JI Shogi-Themed Chess both in 2-kanji and 1-kanji version:

2-Kanji JI Shogi-Themed Chess

1-Kanji JI Shogi-Themed Chess

Details

• The Kings, Rook, Bishop, Knight and Pawns are the same characters used in Shogi. While the Queen was taken from the Queen (奔王 “hon’ou” which literally means Free King) in Chu Shogi, which is perhaps the most popular variant of Shogi.
• Just like in Shogi, there are also two versions of King here which are distinguished by a simple dot or stroke (丶). In shogi, they are called the jeweled general (玉将) and the king general (王将). They are basically just the same piece and the only difference is that the jeweled general is used by the player who is either the challenger, lower-ranked, junior or younger of the two.
• Just like in Shogi, the pieces here in Shogi-Themed Chess also vary in size. With the king being the largest and the pawn being the smallest. Here, there are three sizes: the largest is the King; followed by the two major pieces, Queen and Rook; then by the Bishop and Knight which are minor pieces; and then by the Pawns.
• The board and the 64 spaces are also not squares just like in standard shogi boards but rectangles in portrait orientation.
• I also added the four Star Points from Shogi board. In here, it marks the four central squares (d4, d5, e4 and e5) which are quite important in western chess. The star points will also in a way help in guiding with the diagonals for the Queens and Bishops.
• I, however, decided to keep and use the western chess coordinates rather than the shogi coordinates as chess notations are written using chess coordinates.
• I also decided to make the white chess pieces as sente (first player in shogi) instead of gote (second player) as both white and sente makes the first move in chess and shogi respectively. Add to the fact that the white king is always at the right side of its queen and the black king is always at the left side.

Use JI Shogi-Themed on Lichess

Just follow these simple steps:

1. Add the Stylish Chrome Extension or the Stylish Firefox Add-on.
2. Once Stylish is added, simply install the Shogi-Themed Chess style on Stylish:
   • 2-Kanji Shogi-Themed Chess
   • 1-Kanji Shogi-Themed Chess
3. And once installed, just go to Lichess’s website and voila! You can now play chess using shogi pieces and board design!

Below are screenshots of how they look on Lichess:

2-Kanji Screenshot

1-Kanji Screenshot

The board and the 64 spaces here, however, are perfect squares as Lichess is using a perfect square board for chess. These themes also work well with puzzles and analysis.

Shogi and Chess: Similarities and Differences

In any case that you only play shogi and doesn’t know how to play chess or vice versa, the gameplay, objective and rules are kind of similar for both. That is no surprise as both games have the same origins. I’ll maybe write a how to play shogi or chess in the future but for now, Wikipedia has detailed articles on how to play chess and how to play shogi.

However, to give you the gist of it, below are some of the similarities and differences between the two:

• As a turn-based game, players take turns in moving their pieces.
• The objective is to checkmate (tsumi in shogi) the opponent’s king.
• One quite difference is that their is no drop rule in chess, which means that all captured pieces are out of play; whereas in shogi, you can drop or reuse captured pieces.
• The Kings, Rooks and Bishops move the same way in both games.
• The Kings and the Rooks also have a special move called Castling in chess.
• The Knight also moves the same way but to every direction in chess in contrast with the forward only movement of the knight in shogi.
• Pawns also move the same way but can only capture one space diagonally forward or En passant and has the option to move two spaces directly forward on its first move in chess; while it can only capture one space directly forward in shogi.
• There is also no Queen in modern shogi.
• And there are no Lances, Silver and Gold Generals in chess.
• In chess, only the pawns can promoted while almost all pieces can promote in shogi.
• There are also no draw offers in shogi.

These are some and most important differences between the two. However, if you notice, both games are somewhat similar specially with the gameplay and objective.

Right now, I am also trying to incorporate this design to BCMGames. I also made a Chess-Themed Shogi or westernized Shogi and will probably make a Xiangqi-Theme (Sinicized) and Janggi-Themed (Koreanized) Chess and Shogi in the near future or vice versa.

I think that is it for this post. I hope you enjoy it. If you have any questions, feel free to comment it down below. Thank you and have a great day! You are loved! God Bless =>

^{*Photo used for featured image by GR Stocks on Unsplash.}