Landscape Chess

I had a weekend of chess. Saturday, a couple of friends came over and we played some games. Next day my sister's family came, my nephew wanted to play chess too. So we had a few games.

Then our young daughter wanted to play and we had a good mess around, laughing our heads off as we came up with crazy ideas for new rules and ways that the pieces can move. Then out of the chaos some order arose and we found a fun new way to play chess.

Originally it had another name, but after doing some research we found another chess variant had that name. So to make this variant unique we decided on naming it Landscape Chess. At first we were somewhat disheartened to find somebody had already created a chess variant using a diagonal board, although we initially guessed someone probably would have. However, the other variants all seemed to muddy the beauty of chess. We think this variant complements chess, and even more so it actually brings something new to explore.

How to play Landscape Chess

Setting up

The chess board is turned diagonally, so that a black corner faces each player. The pieces are arranged as shown in the pictures (K is king and N is knight).

Movement

The pieces actually move in the same way as regular chess... except for the pawn, which moves pretty much in the usual manner, only diagonally.

Rules

There is no castling in Landscape Chess. When pawns get to either edge of the other side of the board they can be promoted to any other piece. The goal of the game hasn't changed from regular chess: you must try to get the opponent's king into check mate. 

Landscape Chess has one new rule not found in regular chess: any bishop on a white square can be moved to an adjacent black square, possibly taking an opponent piece in the process. The reason for this new rule is that all bishops begin on white squares at the beginning of the game. This new rule adds much to the strategy and actually makes the bishop a very formidable piece, if used wisely.