If you want to play chess online you can play against JESTER HERE.

You can also use DOODLE CHESS which will act as a referee when you play a friend HERE. If you're not yet used to the moves it's a good idea to use this program to make sure you don't do something you're not allowed to. The program also forces you to play TOUCH AND MOVE, as you have to in tournaments. If you click on a square you have to move that piece. There is a small bug in the program: sometimes it fails to recognize checkmate, announcing check instead. They're working on it and we should have a corrected version up shortly.

But we also have some other games for you to play.

Chess is a difficult game which requires a combination of many different skills to play well.

Two essential skills you need are a high degree of eye-brain co-ordination combined with rapid reactions. You can develop these skills by playing TETRIS. If you reach the highest level you're doing really well.

You also need to develop your concentration and short-term memory. Have a go at our CONCENTRATION GAME to test out and develop these skill. I usually do it in just over a minute. If you can do beat 1 minute 30 seconds you're doing well. If you take less than a minute your memory and concentration are exceptional.Warning - give yourself a break between games - otherwise you'll get very confused.

You can improve your powers of logic and deduction by playing our really cool BATTLESHIP game. The computer doesn't play very well so you should be able to win. Start the game by pressing "deploy" then "finish". You have 20 rounds of 3 shots so choose three squares then press fire. You have three spies which you can use to seek out enemy ships.

We advise children to master simpler two-player strategy/tactics games before getting too far into chess. The simplest of all is TIC-TAC-TOE (Noughts and Crosses). You can win by making a DOUBLE THREAT (and you often will, the computer plays badly) - a concept that is really important in chess. You also learn to look ahead and predict your opponent's moves.

IN our DOTS game you have to connect dots and create boxes. Again, y ou learn to look ahead, and, most importantly, to CALCULATE and to look at EVERY POSSIBLE MOVE before you decide what to do: vital skills when it comes to playing chess. This program plays pretty well but it's not unbeatable.

Finally, the classic games of CHECKERS (DRAUGHTS). Similar to chess, but with simpler rules. Beware, though. In checkers you capture by jumping over an enemy piece: in chess you capture by landing on the square of an enemy piece. Children who are used to playing checkers can get confused when they start to play chess. This program doesn't play to the official tournament rules of checkers in which captures are compulsorry. Also, in this version Red, not Black, plays first. The program plays a reasonable game, but you can beat it with good play.