Chess Tactics Pro (Puzzles) Wiki

I have not encountered a better app-based tactical tool. Easy to use in spare moments (when one does not have enough time for a match). And one can spend a fair amount of time using this app and feel consistently challenged. Its navigation is perhaps not quite as fluid as it would be after some improvement. And I join others in hoping that bugs are fixed relating to scenarios when one can mate in a single move as opposed to the prescribed six, as just one of several examples. I do not write many reviews, but I do so in this instance to echo that a very, very good app could be made even better.

I really enjoy the puzzles. I’ve played chess thousands of times, and even had a PC chess training program around twenty years ago, but I’ve never been very good. I’m on puzzle #36 in the intermediate level, and I was just thinking today that I noticed this method has actually improved my game. The two-four move challenges are not daunting enough to discourage, and I find it hard to not say, “Just one more, just one more...” Each “baby-step puzzle is like a bite-sized candy. Pretty soon you’ve eaten the whole bag! I’m gonna finish them all !!

I like this a lot, but the only thing that is driving me seriously nuts, is that I'm a beginner, and I'm going through easy and I don't necessarily know what the goal of the next step is everytime. For example, I did puzzle 15 on easy, it ended with me taking the bishop, but that wasn't necessarily checkmate. Maybe I'm missing something or im such a beginner that im missing something, but this definitely scratches my chess itch without having to play a whole game. Hope you check out my criticism and respond! Thank you!

All of the puzzles are challenging and helpful. Each tactic poses its own problem and teaches you something that will improve your chess playing ability at any level. Your desire to play will increase since you learn how the game really works and gain confidence in your game as you get better at analyzing each tactic. You will get better at choosing your moves at every stage of the game. This is a wonderful app, and you can buy additional puzzle sets, too.

A great app for learning or reviewing the sharper side of your game. The problems are steeped a bit too much in mates, however that is where most forcing lines are anyway. The format is much better than book diagrams because of the direct interaction. The result is that I am learning from the puzzles as I solve them, or attempt to 🧐. I love the rating challenge to gauge my progress. Overall a wonderful app for players at all levels up to 2200.

I find that each of my chess software programs satisfies a different niche and this one is no exception. The daily puzzles are usually pretty good and many times the only way I’m going to fit in a little brain excercise. I really like the format of 2 easy, 2 medium and 2 hard puzzles each day. For me, it’s just great. I would buy it again and I do recommend this game which runs reliably on my iPad Pro.

Great free chess tactics app. Very user friendly, daily puzzles (easy, medium, hard), comes with free puzzle “Packs” (150 easy, 100 intermediate, 50 hard). Highly recommended, lots of fun and helpful. Devs: I do wish there was a way to show in the board UI the pieces that have been taken by each side - like Shredder. Small piece icons maybe on the left and right, just under the bottom edge of the board.

I’ve played a bunch of the puzzles now, and there have been a bunch of times where it says I made a move incorrectly, when in reality it was wrong. There was a time where I could have checkmated the king by sacrificing my bishop, and it said it was wrong. The correct move wasn’t even checkmate. I continued to go through the problems even after I “solved” them, and found that the king could avoid checkmate 3-5 moves later. It was pretty annoying. But the difficulty was good. Although some puzzles are rated as “easy” they are definitely not beginner, and improved my game quite a bit.

I love the concept of solving chess puzzles but it is too restricted and won’t accept alternative solutions. If it says “mates in 3 moves” and there is more than one sequence to do so, it should slow for that. Restrict it to 3 moves, sure, but don’t say “wrong” just because the sequence isn’t the prescribed one. Relax and allow for some creative experimentation and, if successful, then allow them to then learn the prescribed solution also. Just my opinion.

Working these kinds of problems to me is the most helpful. Playing full games against an engine that never makes a mistake is far less so IMO. My only concern with this app is that I could use more practice with incremental strategy; these problems focus more on big moves. Still the app delivers just the right amount of challenge on a daily basis to keep me thinking like a chess player.

Generally I like this app. However, there are a few mistakes. Occasionally when I can’t solve a puzzle I click on analyze to see the solution. When I try to play the solution myself, the opposing pieces make different moves than those shown in the solution. Also several times when I click on analyze for a two-move solution, the app makes many more than two moves.

I have kept this app on my iPhone for a few years now, coming back to it from time to time. This is a very solid app. First of all, it does not require an internet connection, like many of the other apps do. Most of the problems are correct, i.e. I do not run into bugs too often. I removed one star for the embedded chess engine - not sure what it is, since the name is never mentioned anywhere, but I get the feeling the engine it truly archaic (self made?). Not sure why in all these years the author chose not to upgrade to something like the most recent Stockfish version. And another star was lost due to the combination of minor cosmetic issues: * some minor errors, i.e. the program does not always respond with the best possible move * the board color schemes choice could be a bit better * the board sound is quite strange, more like a click, not very realistic

Of all the chess tactics apps this one is very straight forward and a pleasure to use. (Some of the others out there can get very convoluted with their features.) My only gripe with some of these puzzles is that not all of them contain the most important feature in Chess combinations and that is: The Forced Move. The reason I’m writing this review, was because I just did one of their daily puzzles (nice feature) and after white takes black’s Bishop, the answer for black was to take the bishop with a pawn? Thus exposing the lonely Rook on the back file to be taken with white’s Rook... resulting in mate. Well… any decent player knows that you shouldn’t take that bishop. I find puzzles like this sometimes, but not all the time. Perhaps they need a better chess editor on board? Overall, not a bad app. Definitely worth having.

I liked the game at first and it felt fresh, but after finishing the built in puzzles all I was left with was the daily puzzles. But even with those, I wish the devs would include only “checkmate in x” puzzles, where the end result is a checkmate. I’ve only been doing the hard puzzles, and the game would tell me that a puzzle is “solved” but the actual game still had several moves before even reaching the endgame. This leaves me unfulfilled, and doesn’t help improve endgame or checkmate skills.