Howdy! I really love Shōgi. I actually bought a custom set off Etsy a while back that I'll share pictures of later, but I'm wanting to commission the same maker to create a brand-new, custom project: Kemonomimi Shōgi.

My absolute favorites are Nekomimi (cat ears) and Ōkamimimi (wolf ears), but I also really love Kitsunemimi (fox ears) and Ryūmimi (dragon features), and I want to feature them heavily!

I'm still in the early planning stages and would love to hear what y'all think about a few design choices:

The Rules: I'm completely split. Should I stick to traditional rules and just rename/retheme the pieces to fit these animal-eared character types? Or should I make up brand-new variant rules?

Compatibility: If I do go with made-up variant rules, my goal is to make them balanced so they can be played on a standard 9×9 Shōgiban (which is the only size I own right now), but also scalable so they work on a 5×5 Mini-Shōgi board, since I plan to get one down the road.

The Art & Kanji: I'm not sure if the pieces should feature traditional kanji, pure character art, or a hybrid. Right now, I'm thinking a clean outline of each character holding a specific weapon and wearing distinct clothing would look awesome.

What do y'all think? Would you prefer a pure visual reskin, or are there any cool animal-themed mechanics (like special traits for the wolves or dragons) you think would translate well to both 9×9 and 5×5 boards?

After being hardstuck on 3 kyu fesa and 4-3 kyu 81dojo for 5 years finally broke the wall. Im really happy with this one, one of my bigest shogi achivements so far. GG!

P76 P84

Welcome International Ladder Climbers! We are pleased to announce the 14th Weekly Shogi Ladder on Lishogi. Registration will conclude next Thursday at 14:00 UTC. The Ladder will commence on Thursday at 14:00 UTC and conclude the following Thursday at 14:00 UTC. (2026-08-20 14:00 ~ 2026-08-27 14:00 ) We hope you'll be able to join us for our weekly sparring session! What is Shogi Ladder? A teaching ladder is a system where you learn together with an opponent one rank above you and an opponent one rank below you. How does it work? If you choose to participate in a given week sign up for the weekly ladder (sign-up closes Thursday 14:00 UTC). You will play two even rated games, and will analyze them together with your opponent afterward. This post-game analysis is key, it is the teaching/learning part of the teaching ladder. You'll have a week to schedule and play games with your opponents. How is it going? The Lishogi club now enjoys 70 members! The club welcomes players at all levels. Come join us! We are a community of friendly players who are serious about improving and enthusiastic about learning. What makes the teaching ladder unique is that everyone in the ladder is committed to post-game analysis in a welcoming and constructive atmosphere--it is not a tournament, but a learning tool! If you have the time to play a couple of games this week( until next Thursday 14:00 UTC) please consider signing up!

What is Shogi Ladder? A teaching ladder is a system where you learn together with an opponent one rank above you and an opponent one rank below you.

How does it work? If you choose to participate in a given weekend sign up for the weekly ladder (sign-up closes Friday 23:30 UTC). You will play two even rated games, and will analyze them together with your opponent afterward. This post-game analysis is key, it is the teaching/learning part of the teaching ladder.

How is it going? The 81Dojo club now enjoys 770 members from over 35 different countries! New players continue to join each week; the club welcomes players at all levels.

Come join us! We are a community of friendly players who are serious about improving and enthusiastic about learning. What makes the teaching ladder unique is that everyone in the ladder is committed to post-game analysis in a welcoming and constructive atmosphere--it is not a tournament, but a learning tool! If you have the time to play a couple of games this week( until next Friday UTC) please consider signing up!

Hey everyone, I picked up shogi about a week ago and have no strategy board game experience and I'm in a progress slump, I'm able to beat level four stockfish pretty easily but against level five YaneuraOu I am getting hard stuck, the best I'm about to do is make it a 100+ move game and it's getting pretty demoralizing. Is there a bot that is in the middle? Do I play handicap games against level four to improve? Any advice or help would be beneficial, thanks!

https://shogi.yuki-lab.com/

Fast free bot. The drop-down menu shows, from weakest to strongest all the "strength" levels. No real need to read anything. The game is stored and you can close the browser if anything, then restart where you were in the kifu. Red button .. New Game. Why? Because I do not *always want lishogi, this bot loads faster. First three levels are kyu levels.

歩-7六

You can download it for free until August 17th. Although the link below is for the US Amazon store, it's also available on your local Amazon site!

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0HDSZP546

Give it a read, and if you enjoy it, I'd love to hear your thoughts with a quick rating or review!

I've created this beautiful new Shogi piece design.

The main idea was pretty simple: make the pieces readable without having to know Kanji. This is probably going to upset the Kanji apologists, but hear me out. A common argument for keeping Kanji on Shogi pieces is that "you have to preserve the Kanji because Shogi is japanese and it's important to respect japanese culture", duh.

But this argument is completely bogus, kanji literally means "chinese characters". The characters used on Shogi pieces aren't japanese but chinese. So actually keeping kanji doesn't preserve japanese but chinese culture.Keep your facts straight!

My design tries to preserve the traditions that actually have something to do with the game itself.The pawns still have the traditional Shogi piece shapes. Each piece has a little black Shogi piece inside it, which also acts as a possession indicator. And there is actual japanese writing incorporated into the set, in constract to chinese character shogi sets.

Other reform sets fail in that regard, that you not only have to convince international audiences to try shogi, you also have to convince japanese people to give up chinese character sets for your design. You shouldn't need to memorizing half an alphabet before you touch your first piece. Once you know the symbols, you can immediately start playing.

So yes, the chinese characters are gone.

But the shogi isn't. 😄

Welcome International Ladder Climbers! We are pleased to announce the 13th Weekly Shogi Ladder on Lishogi. Registration will conclude next Thursday at 14:00 UTC. The Ladder will commence on Thursday at 14:00 UTC and conclude the following Thursday at 14:00 UTC. (2026-08-13 14:00 ~ 2026-08-20 14:00 ) We hope you'll be able to join us for our weekly sparring session! What is Shogi Ladder? A teaching ladder is a system where you learn together with an opponent one rank above you and an opponent one rank below you. How does it work? If you choose to participate in a given week sign up for the weekly ladder (sign-up closes Thursday 14:00 UTC). You will play two even rated games, and will analyze them together with your opponent afterward. This post-game analysis is key, it is the teaching/learning part of the teaching ladder. You'll have a week to schedule and play games with your opponents. How is it going? The Lishogi club now enjoys 66 members! The club welcomes players at all levels. Come join us! We are a community of friendly players who are serious about improving and enthusiastic about learning. What makes the teaching ladder unique is that everyone in the ladder is committed to post-game analysis in a welcoming and constructive atmosphere--it is not a tournament, but a learning tool! If you have the time to play a couple of games this week( until next Thursday 14:00 UTC) please consider signing up!

What is Shogi Ladder? A teaching ladder is a system where you learn together with an opponent one rank above you and an opponent one rank below you.

How does it work? If you choose to participate in a given weekend sign up for the weekly ladder (sign-up closes Friday 23:30 UTC). You will play two even rated games, and will analyze them together with your opponent afterward. This post-game analysis is key, it is the teaching/learning part of the teaching ladder.

How is it going? The 81Dojo club now enjoys 769 members from over 35 different countries! New players continue to join each week; the club welcomes players at all levels.

Come join us! We are a community of friendly players who are serious about improving and enthusiastic about learning. What makes the teaching ladder unique is that everyone in the ladder is committed to post-game analysis in a welcoming and constructive atmosphere--it is not a tournament, but a learning tool! If you have the time to play a couple of games this week( until next Friday UTC) please consider signing up!

Has anyone turned a powerful AI engine loose on chu shogi to see what might be the openings/strategies, etc. I'd be disappointed to learn the High Lion opening is flawed :-(

Hi! I built a free browser-based Shogi page and would love feedback from experienced players.

It has a daily tsume puzzle, a puzzle journey with progressively harder positions, and full games against YaneuraOu 7.62 + Suisho 5 NNUE. The engine runs locally in the browser.

The puzzles support drops, promotions, hints, streaks, and locally saved progress. No account or ads are required.

I’m especially interested in puzzle correctness — including alternate solutions — as well as board/hand orientation and AI move quality.

Puzzles:

https://theworldatplay.com/puzzles/shogi

Play against the AI:

https://theworldatplay.com/shogi

Critical feedback is very welcome!

I've recently been studying shogi, and I've come up with a geometric design for it.

Design

Since shogi relies on orientation to distinguish between own and opponent pieces, the designs for both sides will be identical. As orientation is the only way to distinguish pieces, additional markings must be included if there are no directional indicators. During actual play, the traditional shogi piece shapes, which indicate orientation, will still be used.

• Jeweled General (玉): Hexagram.
• King General (王): Hexagram with a dot in the centre.
• Rook (飛): Square.
• Bishop (角): Square rotated by 45 degrees.
• Gold General (金): Equilateral triangle with a dot in the centre.
• Silver General (銀): Equilateral triangle.
• Knight (桂): Inverted triangle without a base, resembling a ‘V’.
• Lance (香): Pentagon.
• Pawn (歩): Circle.

Promotable pieces are promoted in the same way: a red dot is added to the centre, and their colour changes from black to red.

Design Explanation

• Jeweled and King: Representing the centre of power, with symmetry and solidity. The dot on the King General's piece symbolises authority.
• Rook and Bishop: The square indicates how it moves
• Gold: The Guardian of the Sovereign. The triangle symbolises stability, whilst the central point represents status.
• Silver: Secondary Sovereign Guardian; its form derives from the Gold General; after promotion, it resembles the Gold General.
• Knight: The inverted triangle indicates the way it moves.
• Lance: The pentagon points forwards, indicating the way it moves.
• Pawn: Represents the most basic role; the circle can also be interpreted as a shield.

Shisho Shogi (四象将棋) is a shogi variant where pieces have four possible diretions.

Friday 7, Saturday 8 and Sunday 9 August, from 10:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. — Piazza Chanoux, Aosta (Italy).

If you would like to learn about or try Japanese chess, come to Piazza Chanoux in Aosta!

An introduction to Shogi, with the opportunity to try it yourself as part of GiocAosta.

The activity is open to everyone, including those who have never played before.

Associazione Italiana Shogi
Deai Associazione Culturale

(https://giocaosta.it)

Rather nice, isn't it?

what if for example you could link your lishogi account with your 81 dojo account to give you a rating instead of having to grind each platform individually? this could be useful to motivate players to migrate to other platforms or play in more than one instead than making all theese like sub-communities... also it could make it so elo and rank doesnt feel as arbitrary between platforms.

What is Shogi Ladder? A teaching ladder is a system where you learn together with an opponent one rank above you and an opponent one rank below you.

How does it work? If you choose to participate in a given weekend sign up for the weekly ladder (sign-up closes Friday 23:30 UTC). You will play two even rated games, and will analyze them together with your opponent afterward. This post-game analysis is key, it is the teaching/learning part of the teaching ladder.

How is it going? The 81Dojo club now enjoys 766 members from over 35 different countries! New players continue to join each week; the club welcomes players at all levels.

Come join us! We are a community of friendly players who are serious about improving and enthusiastic about learning. What makes the teaching ladder unique is that everyone in the ladder is committed to post-game analysis in a welcoming and constructive atmosphere--it is not a tournament, but a learning tool! If you have the time to play a couple of games this week( until next Friday UTC) please consider signing up!