I built Chess Adventure for my 5-year-old who wanted to play chess but couldn't navigate any of the existing apps too much text, too complex. The app features an AI opponent that starts with random moves and gets smarter as you win, plus local pass-and-play mode. No ads, no subscriptions.
If anyone has a few minutes to try it before launch, I'd love to hear your thoughts especially on the AI difficulty!
https://play.google.com/store/ap...
Curious about the AI difficulty scaling here, does it adapt based purely on win/loss outcomes or does it also factor in things like move complexity or time taken. And how many difficulty levels does the kid realistically progress through before hitting the ceiling.
@hamidesevg79879
Great question! The difficulty adapts based purely on win/loss outcomes — no move complexity or time tracking involved.
Under the hood there are two parameters that adjust automatically:
Randomness vs calculated moves (0–100) — at 0 the AI makes completely random moves, at 100 it always picks the best move it can find
Think time (500ms–3000ms) — how long the AI spends evaluating each move
These two together create a wide progression range. At the lowest end the AI is basically playing randomly, which means even a 5-year-old can win. At the highest end it's running Stockfish (via a C# port called Portfish) at full think time, which is a serious opponent.
In practice the child progresses through many incremental steps before hitting the ceiling — and both sliders are also manually adjustable in settings, so parents can fine-tune it if the auto-scaling moves too fast or too slow for their kid.
Tried this with my niece and she figured it out on her own in minutes. The no-text approach actually works, and the AI ramping up after wins kept her challenged without getting frustrated.
@abdulsamet2lqg
Thank you so much, this is exactly the kind of feedback that makes the whole project feel worth it!