CHECKMATE!

Checkmate puts a full game of chess into Minecraft, then puts your life on the board. Place a chessboard to play anyone on the server, or wait until something tries to kill you: the moment a mob lands what would have been the killing blow, time stops, and it offers you a game instead.
Win, and the mob shatters. Lose, and the blow lands. Every mob plays at its own strength, on its own board.

Duels for your life

• Any mob that would kill you starts a duel instead. You keep the sliver of health you had and get the board.
• Everything around you freezes: mobs, arrows, fireballs, falling blocks, the lot. Other players are not part of the bargain and keep moving.
• Checkmate the mob and it shatters into pieces where it stood.
• Get mated, and the blow that started it all finally lands.
• A draw (stalemate, repetition, fifty moves, bare kings) means time simply resumes. Nobody falls.
• No way out: the screen cannot be closed, and logging out just pauses the game until you return. There is a resign button if you would rather have it over with.

Every mob plays
Each mob has a chess rating, and the stronger the mob, the better it plays. Weak mobs blunder pieces and take long pauses; the strongest think fast and see deep.
Every vanilla mob that can hurt you is rated. Mobs from other mods are rated by their health and damage, so a modded boss plays like one.

A board for every mob
Over fifty mobs bring their own board. The zombie plays rotten green on mud brick, the warden sculk cyan on polished deepslate, the ender dragon on a frame of dragon egg, the wither on crying obsidian, the blaze on nether brick.

Play with friends

• Craft a chessboard from dark oak and birch planks.
• Place it and right-click to open the board. Sit down as white or black; anyone else who opens it watches the game live.
• Resign, offer and accept draws, start a new game, or stand up and let someone else take the seat.
• The pieces stand on the block in the world, so a game in progress is visible to anyone walking past.

The engine

• Built in. The chess engine is part of the mod. No dependencies. Works offline and on servers.
• Full rules. Castling, en passant, promotion with a piece picker, check, checkmate, stalemate, threefold repetition, the fifty move rule, insufficient material.
• A real board. 3D pieces on a board in perspective, animated moves, last move and check highlights, legal move hints, a move list in algebraic notation and the captured pieces.

Credits
Design, code, models, textures and art by me (sphooks).