Journey of the Chess Master (WIP) [5k words]

Hosted Games Works In Progress
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Hi there, everyone. I’m the author of the HGs Trial of the Demon Hunter, Captive of Fortune, and Foundation of Nightmares, as well as the WIP, The Magician’s Task. As a chess tutor and an aspiring Chess Master, I’ve wanted to write an interactive novel about the game for a long time, and now I’ve started this up again.

In Journey of the Chess Master, you are an 18 year old who has just recently graduated high school, and you dream of one day becoming a Chess Master. You are currently a chess tutor, and you are one of the highest rated players in Nebraska, but you are still just a strong amateur. In order to become a Master, you will have to study like crazy, practice constantly, and hardest of all, get through Ronald, the only Master in the entire state, who also happens to be arrogant as hell.

Currently, there is only a very small demo to give you a feel for some of what’s to come, but I plan on making this a large story with tons of chess and lots of (hopefully) interesting and three dimensional characters. Here is what there WILL be when it’s finished:

  • The FIRST and ONLY interactive novel about chess
  • Plenty of tense strategical struggles and brutal tactical melees over the board!
  • Lots of stats that detail your chess attributes, personality, relationships, etc
  • 6 Romance Options: 3 male, and 3 female
  • Choose your gender: nonbinary, male, or female
  • Romance males, females, both, or no one at all

However, progress for this story will be very slow until I finish my main WIP, The Magician’s Task. For the most part, I will only be working on Chess Master when I get stuck on TMT or if I get a lot of inspiration to write for this one.

Anyways, enough of my rambling. Let me know what you think. It will be quite difficult to make this interesting and accessible to readers who don’t play chess, or people who are beginners to the game, but that’s my goal.

DEMO: https://dashingdon.com/play/mastersamuel/journey-of-the-chess-master/mygame/index.php?cb=65897

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Do you actively play a game? I assume that is out of choicescript’s ability

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Probably not move for move because games often last anywhere from 25-60 moves, but I think I would give basic descriptions of the openings, middlegames, and endgames and give you choices to decide what to do in the critical points of each game.

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Sounds interesting. I love chess, and the professionals seem really devoted to the game, so I can see this being fun.

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Awesome. I may try to start a WIP once I submit Foundations of Nightmares in the next few months, which works anyways because then I’ll be closer to Expert and have more credentials for writing about being a chess Master.

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Sounds great then. Good luck in becoming a master!

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I would definitely want to read it! I’d also be interested in seeing what you do with peripheral plot lines (friendships, family, the like). It would be nice to see a few more choicescript games with real-life settings, too.

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Thanks, guys. Yeah, I’m excited to write this and I definitely plan on making it character-oriented. Just off the top of my mind the main characters could be your parents, tutors, opponents, seconds (if and when you become a Grandmaster), and friends you make along the way. It’ll probably be very long and in depth, too.

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They should make Chess an official Olympic sport. Tokyo 2020, though sadly I’m too impatient and easily distracted to be very good at the game of chess myself. I would love to see more of it though, it would give me another olympic discipline to be a fan of, besides the equestrian events. If you want to make a choice game like Slammed!, but about chess, you have my support, especially if you can make it as engaging as Slammed!.

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I think chess is actually an official Olympic sport :slight_smile: and I plan to make this very exciting. Have you, by any chance, seen Pawn Sacrifice where Toby Maguire plays the chess genius Bobby Fischer? It gets pretty intense. And nothing pumps me up more than a blitz chess game. :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

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I’d definitely be interested in your novel.

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Okay everyone, I’ve decided to start this gamebook, with the provisional title being Journey of the Chess Master. I’ll be dividing my attention between Foundation of Nightmares, Kepler, Bovine, and Chess Master, but there will be steady progress. I would expect to post the first chapter for beta in the the next few months or so.

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I like this very much, it’s a breath of fresh air since SLAMMED!, I love chess,I’m not good at it but I have basic understanding of the game.
Might I suggests some sort of tutorial in the game for those who have little to no Idea about chess, also a Glossary of chess moves and terms.
I hope you make the plot really good something that motivates you in the game, like a childhood chess friend turned enemy or your father was an undefeated world champion and you want to become like him one day or at least beat your old Pops.

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I’ve actually started on a glossary and I think it’ll be about 6 pages long when I’m done with it, so hopefully that will be enough for non-chess players to be able to enjoy it and not be as confused. :smile:

I’m definitely going to make that an important part of the story and I’m thinking that you’ll have a choice of what your main motivation is.

EDIT:
Okay everyone, I’ve added a link to a short demo on the first post. So far I just have the stats, achievements, and glossary, but I should have the first chapter done fairly soon.

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This is going to be interesting. I’m used to seeing people write metaphorical chess matches like L vs Light, Holmes vs Moriarty, etc. and not an actual game of chess.

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I’m so excited about this, I already have a romance scene idea, this involves chess and taking off their clothes “Strip Chess” the one who gets naked first loses and the winner decides what the loser will do and you know what the rest of this scene leads to. :blush:

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The demo’s not working; instead of being given any choices on the first page it’s just the standard “Play again/Play more games like this/etc.” you’d normally get at the end of a game.

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Out of curiosity: what is your ELO rating?

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I love L, Light, Moriarty and Holmes! But you never know, I might do something like that. I mean, Fischer vs Spassky was widely thought to symbolize the Cold War.

@Obsidian
I don’t know about that, but I’ll definitely have there be some romance, haha. xD

@Bosoncat
Currently I just have the stats, achievements, and glossary, but it still all amounts to a few thousand words. I’m working on the first chapter as we speak, though.

@Fellow
My Elo is currently about 1600, although I’m training about 20 hours a week and my goal is to be an Expert (2000) by September 2016 and a National Master (2200) by late 2017. I know it sounds crazy, but I’m gonna try.

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Better to try and fail, than never to try at all.

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