Computer Challenge now features six chapters and thirty opponents. Defeat them in order, collect stars, and work toward 48 new Steam achievements. This update also rebuilds the AI's real-time decisions and improves online match stability.
Six chapters. Thirty opponents.
- Progress from First Steps to The Crown Trials. Each victory unlocks the next opponent.
- Discover named opponents with distinct playing styles and scouting tips. Later stages react faster and assess more threats and opportunities.
- Explore a redesigned selection screen with chapter tabs, opponent cards, clear progress, and earned stars.
- Preview locked opponents, continue from your next challenge, and browse with arrow keys or the mouse wheel.
- Review stars and personal bests on the results screen, then challenge the next opponent or try again.
- New challenge screens, opponent information, and Steam achievement names and descriptions are available in all 11 supported languages. Also fixed missing characters when switching languages and text clipping on translated result screens.
48 Steam achievements
- 30 achievements for defeating each Computer Challenge opponent.
- 6 chapter mastery achievements for earning three stars on all five stages in a chapter.
- 6 star milestones at 15, 30, 45, 60, 75, and 90 total stars.
- 6 online victory milestones at 1, 5, 10, 25, 50, and 100 wins.
Previously saved challenge progress and stars count toward the relevant achievements after Steam synchronization. Online milestones count confirmed wins recorded from this version onward; previous rating scores are not converted into historical wins.
AI built around real-time combat
- Reworked decisions consider king safety, piece protection, development, central control, and promotion.
- The AI accounts for pieces already moving, their routes and arrival times, and cooldowns. It is less likely to chase a piece that has already left or enter a losing collision.
- It responds to approaching threats to its king and assesses retaliation after an attack.
- Reduced repeated back-and-forth moves and decisions wasted on pieces that cannot move.
- Difficulty changes reaction and decision-making. It does not give AI pieces faster movement or shorter cooldowns.
Online improvements and fixes
- Fixed cases where movement, combat, retreat, and pawn promotion could resolve differently between players.
- Prevented delayed or duplicate signals from affecting new moves or later matches.
- Improved cancelled lobby joins, starting countdowns, simultaneous rematch requests, and rematch transitions.
- Fixed incorrect victory or defeat displays when an opponent left immediately after a match. A disconnect without a confirmed result does not count as a rated win.
- Fixed older responses overwriting newer rating updates during consecutive matches.
- Fixed board commands being accepted while paused, after a match ended, or when clicking menus. Also corrected collision resolution for pieces that began moving simultaneously.
- Preserved existing challenge stars and improved best-time tracking, local save backup and recovery, and cloud progress merging.
Both players must update to this version to play online together.
Start with your first opponent or continue your saved journey toward the thirtieth crown.