Who doesn't love a good board game once in a while? I’m still waiting for the day when the Wii U has more games like these, but for now I’ll have to make due with Pure Chess. This representation of the classic game has all that you have come to expect and has seen success on a variety of other systems. Now the game has dropped on the Wii U, but sadly with somewhat mixed results.

For the local play, there is actually a lot on offer and this is where Pure Chess actually shines. You can, of course, play a regular Chess match against your preferred skill level. There are no weird gimmicks to this, and you can play up to six matches at a time. Next to this, you can also apply special rules so that players of all levels can make their experiences better fit their skill level . It makes Pure Chess quite a good learning tool for chess in general and something that you can quickly pick up and play.

This feeling becomes stronger when you are introduced to the Learn to Play mode, which offers an extensive tutorial of 40 lessons. Not only will you learn how to play the game, you’ll even learn some important techniques to better help you play the game. For a more delightful challenge, there are also the Chess Challenges; these are separated in to two different sections. First, there are the Bonus Games. Pure Chess will give you one of 100 different situations in which you must conclude the game with a checkmate. You can only do this in a certain amount of moves and this makes it extra tricky in the long run. The second part in all of this is the Tournaments, in which you can duke it against an array of computer opponents.

Players can take their skills and apply them for multiplayer action. When you are playing locally, you can place the Wii U GamePad on a flat surface and the game will instantly turn into a special tabletop version. You can use the regular set-up too, but it would mean a lot of back and forth switching of the controller. Locally can only get you so far though, this is where you would want to play online against others. As previously reported, you will need to make a special Pure Chess account; with this you can play against other Wii U owners and people on Nintendo 3DS, smartphones and tablets. This account can be used with any device of your choice, so that you can continue a certain match on there. It sounds brilliant in theory, but the execution is not as sound.

There are arguments to be made for it being in an early stage, but I waited a number of days to check if it all became better. My time with the online of the title was mostly spent being frustrated at connectivity errors. Signing in to the account proved sluggish and it took all a while to get back on track. Pure Chess is meant to be played for a few minutes online, you come back to it when your opponent decides to make a move. This works for mobile devices or for the Nintendo 3DS, but it is ill suited on a home console as booting a console up for those brief moments is not pleasant.

The game doesn’t do a good job of letting you know something has occurred. A ping from the server sent as a message one way or another, would have been better. Let us say for the sake of argument that you are both online; it still takes an incredible amount of time to get the other side to react. Reactions are sent to the opponent at a slow pace. These problems could have been fixed with a real-time option to keep the Wii U player in mind, but alas, there is nothing like that. I can't see myself going back to the online and that is saddening as the rest of the title is actually quite a good.

The graphics, for example, are quite stunning in Pure Chess and everything has a shiny look to it. It is polished to completion with lovely lighting effects and a colorful but serious presentation. The game likes to show this off too in various dynamic scenes on the television while you are playing it on the Wii U GamePad. You can turn it off if you find it too distracting. The amount of styles are a bit limited, but if you would like more rooms and special pieces, you are able to purchase these as DLC on the Nintendo eShop. The music is quite a good mixture of classic pieces, jazzy tracks and smooth background music to accompany your chess playing. It certainly helps you to bring yourself in the right mood and makes a quick CPU match at the end of the day a fine choice.

Pure Chess is a fine game in its own right, but the online multiplayer ruins it quite a bit and is very ill suited for a home console. You can still have fun with local friends and there are some modes for loners, but it does leave somewhat of a strong bitter taste in the mouth. The presentation is quite well put together and it is quite suitable for a pick up and play game, but it is not the ultimate Chess experience. It’s somewhat of a shame.