Variants on App

Why can't I play all the variants on the mobile app. Its very frustrating playing it in a browser. Please make variants available in android/ios app @chess.com

I think that the variants really aren't very popular compared to regular chess.

Right now, there are 65 variant games being played- in total.

Meanwhile, more than 195,000 are playing regular chess.

If you were chess.com, where would you spend your development dollars?

The numbers came from the variants page.  Doesn't this show 62 games and 124 players?

I believe the chess.com variants people are looking to integrate the four-player chess server with the variant server. I do not know what their plans are after that.

why didn't the chess.com people add the variants already? (As a mobile user) I'm anoyed

Instead of installing the app from the store you can also install the app via the browser as a progressive web app pwa. Just go to the website on your phone and click the add to home screen button under the three dots. This way you get the browser version on your phone and honestly it has more features including varients.

+1
I'd be happy to be able to play variants in the app, too.
+1
for the daily chess variant option

I think you guys are discounting the difficulty of problems like showing multiple boards on a phone.

Exactly. And there are only 1 or 2 devs and a few assistants working on chess.com/variants and chess.com/4-player-chess.

Getting a literal definition of an indie game onto mobile would be very hard and demanding, and considering how Live Chess and Variants servers are seperated and the potential connection issues, it wouldn't be very worthwhile.

On the topic of servers, there is literally KOTH, Crazyhouse, Bughouse, and 3-check etc on Live Chess, and those aren't on the app. Perhaps everyone could request for those to be added on the app before we go into something that would never be realistically achieved in the current stage.

If you want to play the variants just install the pwa version. 

https://medium.com/progressivewebapps/how-to-install-a-pwa-to-your-device-68a8d37fadc1

But they can’t just base everything on the majority! I have been longing to play four-player chess without the Internet issues I have when using the browser. Also there’s not much updating when you run a chess app. How better to use the non-update time than to develop the variants?

+1 wwho would love to play variants on mobile

YES +1!! Also +1 to having specific times of day when Variations open up! Maybe a few variations open up for 2-3 hours a part game time (using a set online clock based on one time zone, so the variations are available for everyone, same time globally) and than have them off or closed for few hours, then reopen, then recluse! For example, 4x segments of 3 hours each of online time divided by 4x segments of 3 hours off time, would make up 24 hours. This way anyone who WANTS Variations would focus their interest on those when their open, therefore MORE players matching their interest will likely be online during those OPEN timeframes, vs having them open all day. These of course, could also Cross play with those on Computer, increasing the chances more are matched.

That my 2.5 cents worth!! 😁

a lot of people quit chess because they get bored of regular chess and dont even know about variants

Do this on safari if u are on IOS/IPADOS—

Just use a browser, click on the share button and then scroll down and click on add to home screen and then u can log in and u can do it

That’s what I do! I am on mobile too but watch this:

U can do this too!

you could do just the simple variants; fog, give, atomic and you could have a mobile only sever to avoid the difficulties of integration

Chesscraft is a good android app where you can create your own custom pieces and variants.