Aart's Android Page

As a fun project, Aart Bik implemented three board games for Android, which are available for free at the Android Market or as direct downloads below. The games accept touch screen or trackball input and automatically adjust the board layout to the screensize of the device in either landscape or portrait orientation. Please note that the applications were developed in pare time, and as such do not have elaborate features. Nevertheless, hopefully you will enjoy playing the games. Manuals and background can be found in the Android Game Manuals and at Aart's Blog. Information on developing Android applications can be found at Android Developers and the Android Wiki.

Chess for Android

[ChessIcon] [CHESS] Chess for Android consists of a chess engine (a Java version derived from the C++ engine BikJump) and a GUI. The application accepts moves through the touch screen, trackball, or keyboard (e2e4 pushes the king pawn, e1g1 castles king side, etc.). An optional "move coach" highlights valid user moves during input and last played engine move. Full game navigation buttons enable users to correct mistakes or analyze games. Games import and export as FEN/PGN to and from the clipboard, load and save as file, are set up through a position editor, or import as application/x-chess-pgn MIME type on startup. A draw by stalemate, insufficient material, the fifty move rule, or threefold repetition is recognized. The engine plays at various levels (including random, against itself in auto-play, or free-play, where the game can be used as a "magnetic chessboard"). The user can play either side and, independently, view the board from the perspective of white or black.

The application supports the Universal Chess Interface (UCI) and Chess Engine Communication Protocol (WinBoard and XBoard), which allows users to play against more powerful third party engines or even play tournaments between engines (see e.g. these Android Chess Engine Tournaments). Engine setup features pondering, infinite analysis, hash tables, multiple threads, endgame tablebases, and opening test suites. Details can be found at UCI and XBoard Protocols for Android. Engines that can be imported are listed at UCI and XBoard Engines for Android.

See also the Chess for Android Manual.

Checkers for Android

[CheckersIcon] [CHECKERS] Checkers for Android consists of an 8x8 checkers engine (a Java version that evolved into the C++ engine BikMove) and a GUI. The application accepts moves through the touch screen or trackball. An optional "move coach" shows all valid user moves and highlights each last played move. An undo feature can take back up to eight half-moves to correct mistakes. The engine plays at various levels (including random and free-play). By popular request, an option was added to select between mandatory captures (the official rule) or optional captures (a common home rule, but without "huffing", where the piece that should have performed the capture is forfeited; instead the game simply continues). The user can play either side and, independently, view the board from the perspective of white or black.

See also the Checkers for Android Manual.

Reversi for Android

[ReversiIcon] [REVERSI] Reversi for Android consists of a reversi engine (verified with perft) and a GUI. The application accepts moves through the touch screen, the trackball, or through the keyboard. An optional "move coach" shows all valid moves as ghost stones and highlights the new and flipped stones after each engine move. An undo feature can take back up to eight half-moves to correct mistakes. The engine plays at various levels (including random and free-play). The user can play either side.

See also the Reversi for Android Manual.

Please note that this page is privately maintained by Aart Bik. LinkedIn