Philip Ryan wrote on Thu, Dec 12, 2002 11:59 PM UTC:
(I'm John's father, and we did discuss this... but the game and the design
is entirely John's.)
The 'Nexus' spaces are certainly a novel idea. After discussions with John
they can be thought of as being that each space has its parallel universe
space on the flipside. Probably this would create a challenge for a
deterministic chess rule set, since the player can decide whether the
piece stays in its current universe (flipside/topside), or shifts to the
other (topside/flipside respectively), EVEN in the MIDDLE of a move. Thus
a Knight can move through a Nexus space and the player can decide if the
Knight remains in the current 'universe' or has shifted to the other.
There is one piece which can only move in one direction through the Nexus
spaces, and that is the Pawn. By the above logic, the move from flipside
to topside does not take up a pawn's move. A Pawn could go from Circle 6
to 7, for example on the Topside. The next move that the Pawn could make
is to go from Circle 7 on the Flipside to Circle 6 on the Flipside.