H. G. Muller wrote on Tue, Sep 13, 2016 08:28 AM UTC:
A problem is that outside Netherlands or Russia, where Draughts is popular, people in general have no access to 10x10 boards, and even larger boards will be a problem in any case.
Most people play games because they were exposed to them as a child, usually by their parents. This is often driven by the availability of equipment to play it. That causes a huge inertia. In this age of electronics this barrier could perhaps be broken by having smartphone Apps taking over the role of 'woodware'.
But for the time being any variant that cannot be played on an 8x8 board with a normal Chess set stands very little chance of being embraced by a large community, no matter how good a game it would be. Another issue is that to compete with Chess the game doesn't just have to be good. It has to be significantly better. And for that it needs some outstanding new feature that Chess doesn't have. Just another size board an some pieces that move in a slightly different way wouldn't cut it.
A problem is that outside Netherlands or Russia, where Draughts is popular, people in general have no access to 10x10 boards, and even larger boards will be a problem in any case.
Most people play games because they were exposed to them as a child, usually by their parents. This is often driven by the availability of equipment to play it. That causes a huge inertia. In this age of electronics this barrier could perhaps be broken by having smartphone Apps taking over the role of 'woodware'.
But for the time being any variant that cannot be played on an 8x8 board with a normal Chess set stands very little chance of being embraced by a large community, no matter how good a game it would be. Another issue is that to compete with Chess the game doesn't just have to be good. It has to be significantly better. And for that it needs some outstanding new feature that Chess doesn't have. Just another size board an some pieces that move in a slightly different way wouldn't cut it.