User:SomeChess/sandbox

Choker™ is a free-to-play mobile app released by Queenside Games on November 27 2019, for iOS and Android. The game combines both Chess and Poker, with players betting on cards made up from pieces of a standard chess set.

In December 2020, it was announced a browser version of the game was in development.

Classic
The gameplay has three phases, betting, placement and chess. In the betting phase, players are dealt cards from a deck of 44 Choker cards, each deck contains four queens, eight bishops, eight rooks, eight nights and sixteen pawns.

In the first betting round, two cards are dealt to each player, where they bet on the strength of their cards using chips. There are options to raise, call, check or fold. The game features a pot, which players each put chips into at the start of the game and can add to during the betting phase.

There are several promotions and demotions available in the game, for instance, a third dealt pawn will promote to a rook and a second dealt queen will demote to a pawn.

After two more rounds of betting, featuring four cards, then five, players move on to the placement phase which sees players take turns to place their cards, which convert to the relevant piece, onto the board. Each player automatically starts with a king placed in their normal position and a pawn in front.

Once all of the pieces are placed onto the board, the chess phase begins and white goes first. Whoever wins the chess round will win the pot.

Hijack
Whilst Hijack features similar gameplay to Classic, there are some notable differences. Instead of the initial betting rounds, players immediately go all-in but have the opportunity to improve their hands by buying privileges such as "The Swap", whereby players bid to swap their hand with their opponent; "The Drop" which can be used to switch two cards from their hand with new ones from the deck and "The Peek" which allows players to see their opponent's hand.

AI Battle
The single-player campaign of Choker sees players battle against an army of Choker playing robots. Each robot defends a city on the World Choker Tour. When a player beats each robot 4 times they will unlock the city and proceed to the next one. There are 7 robots in total.

Challengers Choker Cup
In May 2020, chess24.com announced it would be hosting the Challengers Choker Cup. The cup saw participants competing in a series of knock-out rounds with the winner of the semi-final facing 5-time US Chess Champion Hikaru Nakamura.

The cup ran from May 2020 and concluded in July 2020.

Browser Edition
In December 2020, Queenside Games announced a browser edition of the game was in development. The browser edition is set to feature the same gameplay but will offer larger visuals to accommodate desktop monitor displays.

In March 2021, early access to the browser edition was opened up to a select group of players.