There’s nothing more devastating to your morale than losing your queen while playing a game of chess. She’s like Mario after he’s found himself one of those invincible stars — except she can still be wiped out by a pawn. But here’s an interesting take on the classic game that sees every piece replaced with nothing but queens, and on a smaller board.
The gameplay with the $US13 All Queens Chess is totally different, though. The goal isn’t to capture all of your opponent’s pieces. In fact, there’s no capturing allowed at all. Instead, two players compete to get four of their queens lined up in a single row. So it’s more like playing Tic-Tac-Toe, except every piece is constantly in movement being used to complete a row or to strategically block an opponent. What hasn’t changed is that by the end of a game you’ll hate whoever’s on the other side of the board, and isn’t that what board games are all about? [ThinkFun Inc.]