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Global Chess. A chess game played on a board composed of two rotating disks. (2x(), Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]
Charles Gilman wrote on Sat, May 31, 2003 07:13 AM UTC:Good ★★★★
Am I right in thinking that valid moves through Poles include:
a2-a1-e1-e2 for Rooks?
a2-b1-e1-f2 and a2-h1-e1-d2 for Bishops?
or is it a2-b1-g1-h2 and a2-h1-c1-b2 for Bishops?
Do the Poles give Knights any special moves?

Brian wrote on Wed, Jan 28, 2004 07:02 AM UTC:
As for the bishops, make no piece allowed to cross the pole

Anonymous wrote on Sat, Oct 14, 2006 11:17 PM UTC:
The concept fot this game was orgionaly conceived by a Mr Peter Wison following a discussion on the feasibility of playing chess on a globe with the specific intention of being able to play chess on a bord without borders. At the time, Peter Wilson insisted that pole crossing rules had to be added to prevent royalty from assuming strengths and weightings not normally available to them. To this end he proposed that no piece crossing the pole should be able to move beyond the first sqaure adjacent to the pole. No further restrictions were envisaged.

John Smith wrote on Sun, Dec 14, 2008 09:30 AM UTC:
I don't understand how Bishops can access every square. Shouldn't Bishop's move to the square directly across from them, then continue in either normal direction?

Rich Ingebrigtsen wrote on Sat, Oct 3, 2009 01:08 PM UTC:
I have a copy of this game and enjoy it very much. I am interested in finding another copy of the game and am having trouble doing that. Anyone out there have 'Global Chess' for sale?

🕸Fergus Duniho wrote on Sat, Aug 7, 2021 06:13 PM UTC:

I have been testing the ZRF, which I got on the Zillions-of-Games website here:

https://zillions-of-games.com/cgi-bin/zilligames/submissions.cgi?do=show;id=450

It looks like the following may be true:

  • The Rook moves as it does in other spherical variants, such as Miller's, Nadvorney's, and Chou's Chess on the Dot.
  • The Knight moves as it does in Nadvorney's Spherical Chess, which is the same as it moves in Chess on the Dot.
  • The Bishop moves as it does in Chao's Chess on the Dot, though there are some details I'm not sure about yet.
  • The Queen moves as a Rook or a Bishop.
  • In addition to moving one space as a Queen, a King near a pole can make two moves that are unavailable to Rooks, Bishops, and Queens. It can move to the space on either side of the one directly opposite it across the pole.
  • There is no castling.

🕸Fergus Duniho wrote on Sat, Aug 7, 2021 07:37 PM UTC in reply to Fergus Duniho from 06:13 PM:

It looks like the ZRF got the King's movement wrong. According to this archived page on the King, the King moves the same as it does in Chess on the Dot, which gives it only six moves near the pole, and it can castle.


🕸Fergus Duniho wrote on Sat, Aug 7, 2021 09:14 PM UTC:

Many of the archived pages are lacking graphics. I will provide links to pages with complete graphics:

I could not find complete graphics for the other pieces. The Bishop page has one graphic image, but it does show an important difference from the Bishop in Chess on the Dot. When passing through a pole, a Bishop may continue its move in either direction, whereas in Chess on the Dot, it must continue its move in the same direction it was going before. The text on the Queen indicates that it moves as a Rook or a Bishop and has the same ability as the Bishop to move diagonally in either direction after passing over a pole. The text on the Pawn page does not indicate anything unusual. It moves as it does in other Spherical Chess variants.

Based on what I could glean of the rules from archived copies of the website, Global Chess is mostly like Chess on the Dot but has a few differences:

  1. Only normal castling is available. If, for example, the white King has a clear path to the a1 Rook in either direction, it can castle by moving to c1 but not by moving to g1. Whereas Chess on the Dot would also allow castling by moving to g1.
  2. The Bishop in Global Chess is more powerful, because it can go in either direction after passing over the pole, whereas the Bishop in Chess on the Dot may only continue in its original direction.
  3. The Knight has only six moves when near the pole, as it does in Miller's Spherical Chess. The extra two moves available in Chess on the Dot (and also in Nadvorney's version) are not shown in the diagrams for the Knight.

🕸Fergus Duniho wrote on Mon, Aug 16, 2021 12:23 PM UTC in reply to Fergus Duniho from Sat Aug 7 09:14 PM:

Now that I have bought a set off of ebay, I have a better understanding of the rules. I was wrong about the last two points I made in my previous comment. The only discernible difference from Chess on the Dot is the castling rule. I have now described both games together on the Spherical Chess page.


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