Really Bad Chess Wiki

This game is endless entertainment, I love the AI(although it does make what I would call mistakes) it always poses a good challenge, regardless of difficulty level. I have had a great time playing the game, level 15 up to 102, where strategy changes a bit toward seeing how much you can get the AI to mess up. I think the decision making in the AI is best in the 50-75 rank range, as far as entertainment value goes. I haven’t experienced many bugs, occasionally the game will crash but it has saved the game state most of the time so it will reload where it left off. The ad integration is great, they are hardly annoying or intrusive, since you choose when to play them, although I do get the same ad nearly every time. I would love a pvp mode across devices. The 1v1 seems okay but net play with friends would be a real treat. I know that is another order of complexity when it comes to app development but I love this game and playing it with friends would be amazing. Thank you for creating this!

Have been playing chess since I was a kid. But can't recall ever being so excited about the game until this surreal and wacky version of the game appeared recently. Not only is it truly fun and exhilarating, but some of the mating nets which arise during play can be truly beautiful, if utterly bizarre. For longtime players it's magical to trap your opponent with, say, four bishops or some other acid-trip combination. Let's face it, regular chess is frequently a dour serious time-consuming business. Really Bad Chess turns the game upside down, is quick to play, and is highly addictive. A delight in every way. Bravo, Zach Gage! Bobby Fischer, who proposed Fischer Random Chess, would approve of this game one suspects. If you're a chess purist or snob, you owe it to yourself to give this app a shot. Kick in the measly $2.99 while you're at it. Gage thoroughly deserves it.

I absolutely love this game. A wacky take on a great strategy game. My only problem is that the game seems to refuse to tie. I somehow ended up with two kings. I know this game said to throw out all we know about chess, but it seems odd that I have to forfeit just to go to another game. Even moving a piece back and forth 50+ times to the same two spaces didn’t draw the game. That means the AI wins and I lose rank when in reality it should be a draw and I keep the same rank. I know loss in rank is very minimal, but it still seems like the game should know when winning is impossible and will draw the game. This and the fact that I can’t free mode the daily after I have lost both time. I understand you shouldn’t be allowed to free mode the daily if you haven’t won, but it would be fun to give extra tries to it even though I lost. Anyways, these two issues are extremely tiny and arguably nit picking, so I only took off one star as everything else is a ton of fun!

For what the game is, it's extremely fun and entertaining. I mostly play against the AI, and it's for these reasons that the review is not a perfect score. The AI is not glitchy or broken in anyway, but simply a bit irritating. I find that once you get to be around rank 65-70, you have to win either by a landslide or you lose. Due to the inability to tie games, I've lost multiple games that should've ended in a tie (or that I could've even won) simply because the AI would alternate between two moves that most of the time would put me in check until I forfeited a piece. This would never happen if you could tie a game, or if the AI couldn't just repeat the same move forever. Other than this, the game is excellent and I would recommend it to anyone who likes or even dislikes chess.

To whom it may concern, I downloaded this game two days ago. Since then I’ve played it non stop and I love everything about it. But each time I down load it then next day that game doesn’t play. I’ll open the game and you will see the loading screen, then it comes to the main menu and after that it instantly shuts. It does that every time you open it. Untill you delete and download it again. Then it play perfectly untill the next day and everything starts back over. I’m not sure why it seems like the game only lasts one day with me. But please fix this because I want to play this game and I don’t want to keep deleting all of my stats to just play it again. Thank you and yours truly, Brennen Efird

A chess game that's actually fun. The AI isn't very smart, but neither am I (when it comes to chess, anyway), but that really doesn't matter here. It's actually helping me learn how to look at the whole board. I've purchased multiple copies for multiple devices, and the game is currently my go-to 5-minute time-passer. One enhancement request - plz make it possible to re-play a game in free play mode...especially when I lose. I've lost on level 10 or 12 more times than I care to admit, and when I do, I'd like to take another crack at it. Oh, and there's one minor bug: when I make a move that results in a stalemate, the game tells me that I've won.

This game helps you learn the basics of chess. I am not a great chess player, but I know how to play. Of course, you don’t get used to playing with the normal amount of pieces, but that is the main thing that makes it unique, but the developers don’t claim to have a normal chess game. There are a lot of ads, but you can easily bypass this by putting your phone on airplane mode and playing offline. This game can help people learn how each piece moves and I think it’s great for people who want to learn how to play chess. And it provides a challenge to those who are good at chess by adjusting your skill level.

This is a really cool idea and has great potential! But I quickly got tired of it after 2-3 weeks...mainly because it was really fun at first and it was new. But soon, it gets to where the computer has far better pieces; then I win, I go up 8, I loose I go down 2, until eventually I start to plateau, winning 1, loosing 4 and so on because I stay disadvantaged...It not real chess, and I get tired of having 1Q and 1R against the AI’s 3Q and 3Q...it starts to become work and lots of loosing when I wants it to be fun and entertaining and maybe win half instead if going up 8 points and then down 2 on losses until it gets easier again...like I say, it’s not real chess and I don’t feel like I’m not learning a whole lot from the losses since the pieces are random. Another irritating thing about the game, 3 repeated moves with the King and AI’s piece is not a stalemate, but will go on forever until you give up pieces for the AI to win or if you can’t block the you’ll go back and forth until you surrender...

Like you ad says, WHY NOT? I have ENJOYED EACH GAME! I know I am a horrible chess player. I taught my 10 year old brother to play...I never won another game from him. ***I sincerely hope that you have an AWARD for poorest player; I’ll win it no problem...I have not won a game yet here either. I have a few NEW PLAYER SUGGESTIONS. THE STARS will go higher.... Questions...1) why can’t I move any of my three pawns?? There were several times that if I was allowed I would have distracted their Queen...and blocked a ROOK. (you have to play to understand the above...) 2) I’m confused about the red attacks, when I attack the attacker, nothing happens...it freezes. 3) what’s happening with the blue line on the AI s side? What does it do, besides distracting me!!! 4) Will I ever be allowed to get a Queen in place of the Pawn who walked to the rear of the AIs lines??? *****If I ever win, I hope you have fireworks!!! At least now, I have a reason to lose and laugh while I’m doing it!

i like the game because it has • personality • a nice interface • a high level of approachability • a nice look to it just sitting on my home screen and it’d be a lot cooler if it... • reduced the ads to banner ads only; OR if it completely removed ads and added something else to the $2.99 in app purchase; OR if banner ads were removed and players would have to watch a video ad every time they used up 5 undos • implemented a live pvp mode (player profiles don't have to be a thing although that’d be cool obviously); maybe even tournaments • had a regular chess mode (just to help make RBC the app store’s best all-in-one chess app) • made it possible to play as black • made the AI take a little less time to make its move; especially obvious ones • (gonna nitpick here for everyone who didn’t) polished the movement of any animated functions (the blue “thinking” bar, the spinning rook, the menu, etc.) that’s it. i know it’s an indie game and that it’s not your only project so i can imagine that these ideas won’t be seen for a long time. hopefully a future update will come along so people will stick around for long enough to see some of them be included. they can really make RBC a big competitor to other chess apps, which probably wasn’t the goal but why not?

It seemed like a great game at first, and I made the mistake of purchasing the version without ads. The odds are never in your favor. Let me explain this more thoroughly. The board is set up against you, even on a difficulty level of zero. The AI opponent can leisurely stroll a bishop across the map—first turn—and take one of your pieces. If you are unprepared, it will take two of your pieces, sometimes three. Almost all the time, you’ll have two of three unguarded pieces, so even if you set up to protect a piece, you’ll have compromised the others. The opponent’s entire back row is set with queens, bishops and rooks, so you cannot swipe a bishop across the board without having it taken immediately- so, it’s not really worth it. They also have no pawns and you have plenty- sometimes even in the back row. While pawns may become queens by reaching the other side, it’s near impossible to do so when every single piece on the other side can put-maneuver or block it. So, pawns are essentially useless. Yes, I know that in card games like poker, it’s about how you play the cards, but imagine playing against an opponent with all aces. It’s doable, but never in your favor. So, I say again: it’s a great concept, but the rather unfair set-up has lost my interest.

This app is good and its really fun and addicting, but.... there is a few problems. 1. There should be a easier way to win, let me explain. Whenever i capture all of the opposing teams pieces and I'm only left with queen vs queen, I CANT WIN the other queen-no matter how hard the difficulty- always runs away or keeps moving, it doesn't even make a move on you. You cant capture her. 2. You are not allowed to move where the other team would capture you. Whenever i move a piece and its in the way of the opposite team it wont let me. This game doesnt let you have a chance to get captured (not that you would want to) but its not like real chess. Overall the game is good but can you please fix these things, i know its called really bad chess but its the only good chess game out there and i would like it to be like real chess. And this is coming from someone who doesnt know how to play chess but would like to through this game. One more thing you shouldn't have to PAY to change the color of your board or PAY to play with friends its retarded i would like to play or challenge with friends but i cant becaise it costes $2.99 which i think is really quite expensive for a chess game and a little extra features .

My first game ended with my opponent having a king and 2 black bishops. I had a king, 2 pawns and 3 white bishops. However, all the opponent had to do was park his 2 bishops on a single diagonal, such that both were attacking one of the two promotion squares for my pawn, and there was nothing I could do to progress. I couldn’t kill his bishops because nothing would rech them, I couldn’t promote either pawn without losing it (while still being unable to kill the attacking piece), and I couldn’t checkmate without at least 2 piece that could force an attack on a blck square. However, I also don’t want to resign, because I feel like I have the superior position and materiel. This is why chess has the stalemate option, something that Mr. Gage apparently didn’t understand when he made this game. The game may be technically interesting, but the implications of what it does clearly were not thought all the way through.

This game is an excuse for you to use as much redo as possible. They do not allow ties or stalemates so that you will take dozens of rewinds to get to a point before a serious mess up. For parts like the daily board, you are temped to undo because of it's "streak." But the part where in a chess, there is NO stalemate, that really upsets me. You can't have 2 kings running around without any other pieces. That will NEVER end, but the game says "Hey, I win. I don't care if we both have the same piece left. I win because I said so." If you want a real chess game or chess with a unique way of playing, look somewhere else. Just go play some Kamikaze chess or chess with multiple layers. But if you like this, go get multiple chess sets and set them randomly. Anything is better than this ad-infested, money seeking, time-wasting, stress-inducing excuse of a game.