Game Details
- Publisher: Ripstone
- Developer: VooFoo Studios
- ESRB Rating: “E” for Everyone
- Genre: Board Games
- Pros: Looks fantastic; nice soundtrack; tutorials; challenges; tons of options
- Cons: Weird online implementation
- MSRP: $12.49
Pure Chess: Grandmaster Edition is a comprehensive and fully
featured chess game suitable for players of all skill levels. It features ten difficulty levels to test
you skills against the A.I. as well as an extensive set of tutorials to teach
you how to play if you’re a true beginner.
For more experienced players there are 100 challenges where you have to
figure out how to get checkmate in a limited number of moves. There are also tournaments where you have to
beat increasingly difficult A.I. opponents to advance.
There are an impressive number of options available in Pure
Chess: Grandmaster Edition to alter A.I. behavior, allow you to take back
moves, and more. You also get to choose
from several different styles of chess sets, including what materials they’re
made out of, as well as play in several different locations and even what
(subtle and smooth and atmospheric) music plays in the background. A lot of attention was given to make the
game classy and refined, just like chess deserves.
Playing local multiplayer or against the A.I. works just
like you’d expect, but the online play mode is set up strangely here. If you find a person who is actually paying
attention and plays quickly you can finish a game and have a fairly good time,
and there are no weird load times between moves like in previous versions of
Pure Chess on other platforms. Not
everyone seems to want to play quickly, however, and since there are no time
limits to force your opponent to make a move, games can stretch out over
unreasonably long periods of time. The
game even lets you play a sort of “play by mail” style of chess where you can
play the same game against the same person over the course of several days if
you want because there are slots to save multiple ongoing games at the same
time.
That is fine if you’re playing against a friend or family
member and it could be a fun shared daily ritual or something, but allowing
games against random players to just stretch on endlessly seems odd to me. It just invites other players to waste your
time. Even worse, some people give up
and stop playing entirely but that abandoned game sits in your saved game slots
until one side or the other actually resigns, which counts as a loss so no one
wants to do it. There is also no
in-game voice chat, so you can’t even talk to the randoms you’re playing
against.
All of this adds up to an online experience that, depending
on the opponent, can be anywhere from enjoyable (if they play quickly) to
unbearable (if they dink around and waste your time). I also really dislike the feature that sends you an Xbox Live
notification every time it’s your turn.
I can see how that would be useful if you actually wanted to play a
slowly paced game over several hours / days / months and need to be reminded,
but getting 43,090 pop up notifications in 30-minutes while playing a normally
paced game with an attentive opponent is totally obnoxious. And there’s no way to turn that feature off
in-game. You have to turn off
notifications entirely on the Xbox One dashboard to save yourself from the
bombardment of messages. That’s nuts!
The Pure Chess series has a history of poorly implemented
online features like this, so it sort of boggles the mind that they keep releasing
them with the same problems people complain about over and over again. Online play is, admittedly, smoother in the
Grandmaster Edition that it has been in previous releases, but it is still far
from optimal. The whole appeal of
online chess is to be able to play with another human being any time you want,
but with no chat to keep you entertained and no time limits to keep the game
moving, playing online is a boring chore more often than not rather than being
fun or satisfying.
One area that Pure Chess: Grandmaster Edition absolutely
nails is the presentation. The game
looks totally gorgeous and stunningly realistic thanks to great looking
environments, exquisitely rendered pieces, and remarkably good lighting. Seriously, the game looks amazing. It also sounds very good too with a nice
selection of subtle and smooth music genres to choose from that really set the
mood and let you concentrate.
In the end, Pure Chess: Grandmaster Edition is the
same old song and dance from the franchise.
It has great presentation, a ton of options, and is amazing for solo
play or local multiplayer, but the online aspect is a total letdown if you play
with anyone other than friends or family.
Even if you don’t care about online play and only want to play solo or
locally, the $12.49 asking price is a little absurd considering the massive
selection of cheaper or free chess options available on pretty much every
platform under the sun. It is a shame,
too, because Pure Chess: Grandmaster Edition is such a great chess game in
almost every other way besides the online aspect. Wait for a sale.
Disclosure: A review code was provided by the publisher.
