Distant Armies: A Playing History of Chess screenshots

The startup screen is animated. The chess board moves underneath the knight. A downside is that there is no music.

Here is where chess was first played. As you choose between games, the opening menu gives you a brief background of when the game was played and shows you where on the map.

Los Alamos, United States. Possibly where the first working computer chess game was programmed into a computer. Of course, graphic operating systems were several decades in the future...

Decimal Chess, 2-Dimensional Board. Decimal chess is loaded with super-powerful chess pieces.

The Giraffe in decimal chess can jump over pieces like a knight, but also has the moves of a modern chess queen. Here Distant Armies' show possible moves feature is turned on.

The Giraffe is called Zurafa in the game. Here it shows just how one can command the chess board.

Medieval Chess (shown in 2-Dimensional form) comes much closer to the modern chess game.

Also resembling modern chess is Shatranj, A.D. 640 to 1700 in the Middle East.

Built into the game is a history of chess, complete with documentation showing where the programmers got their information.

The game shows how chess worked it's way out of Pakistan, east to China and West to the Middle East and Europe.

Chess timeline, used in the history.

The eastern versions, such as Chaturanga shown here, often had elephants (think medieval tanks).

The eastern games had more powerful chess pieces, as the history details.

Here the Zurafa or Giraffe is described in detail.

Not content with a square board, Byzantine chess is on a round board, with two fronts of attack. A piece can move in a complete circle if it is not impeded.