Marshal Chess

Marshal Chess is a clean, focused Chinese Chess (Xiangqi) app for iPhone and iPad. No social noise — open it and play.

Six modes:
· Adaptive Coaching — the AI silently reads your level and stays just one step ahead, easing off when you are far ahead and pushing harder when you are behind. On your turn it lifts the piece for the strongest move to show you. No difficulty picker, no tests, no prompts
· AI Match — five difficulty levels (Beginner to Master); the on-device engine's evaluation is a neural network distilled from a top engine, so you get a strong opponent even offline, and online Hard / Master are computed by a top engine on our server; save and resume any game, take back moves
· Jieqi (Hidden Chess) — every piece except the generals starts face-down in a shuffled position and is revealed after its first move; revealed advisors and elephants may leave the palace and cross the river. The computer never peeks at hidden pieces
· Endgame Puzzles — 90 classical compositions from the Ming-dynasty collection "Shi Qing Ya Qu", each with its source and original number; all 1,416 moves of the reference lines verified for legality and checkmate. Search by name or number, filter to unfinished
· Nearby Duel — play someone next to you over a direct device-to-device connection. No data usage, no server, no shared network needed; just turn on Wi-Fi and Bluetooth on both devices. Game clocks with a per-move countdown, take-backs, Jieqi and automatic reconnection; a player who leaves can return to the same game from the lobby, and an optional password keeps strangers out
· Game Study — when you face a real opponent over a physical board, enter both sides' moves and get the strongest move on your turn. Start from the opening position or use the board editor. Live camera and photo recognition run on-device, with a review step to correct or complete the position; optional cloud enhancement is available

Design notes:
· Calm, modern Chinese look: warm paper background, clerical-script glyphs and nine board themes to choose from (Warm Ivory, Kaya Wood, Pale Celadon, Ebony and more), switchable even mid-game; a bundled Kai typeface works offline and dark mode is supported
· Just the board: no title bar or status line during play — Menu at the top left, More at the bottom right, in Liquid Glass
· Background music, a full sound set and Mandarin move announcements, adjustable in-game or silenced to let your own music play
· Move and capture animations play in sequence for a clear rhythm
· No ads, no in-app purchases, no account required. Recognition runs on-device by default. If you choose cloud enhancement and consent, the selected photo is sent through Cloudflare to Anthropic; see our privacy policy

Xiangqi is interesting enough on its own. We just built a good board for it.