Dice Chess for Fire TV

Chess with a roll of the dice, built for the living room: luck gives newcomers a real chance, so the whole family can play. Share one remote, or take on one of three computer opponents.

Play the beta Watch the demo What it does Get the code

Family chess with a roll of the dice

Three dice choose which pieces may move each turn. Luck gives a newcomer a real chance against a stronger player, so a family can play one game together.

Made for the remote

The arrows jump between the pieces that can move, then between the chosen piece’s destinations. Over 200 simulated games, a turn takes 8.7 presses instead of 22.6 square by square.

Three opponents on the TV

Rolly plays any legal turn at random, Grabby takes the most valuable piece it can, and Rampage goes for your king. Each card shows your record against it, and you can play either colour.

Music that follows the game

Four themes by pepka-prygni: one for the menus, and three that grow tenser as your king comes into danger. Settings turns the music and the sound effects on or off.

Offline and private

The rules, the computer opponents and the saved games all stay on the TV. There is no account, and the app’s source contains no network calls.

Open source

The app is AGPL-3.0-only, and it plays by Fortemate’s open-source rules engine, so anyone can read how a move is judged.

Play the demo video on YouTube: Grabby's queen slides in to take a bishop — The demo, 1:16 on YouTube, recorded on the Vega Virtual Device: hotseat, the computer opponents, the tutorial and the rules.

A hotseat game: Black's knight is picked up, its destinations are dotted, and three dice sit beside the board — Hotseat on one remote

Playing Black against Grabby, with the board turned so that Black is at the bottom — Against the computer, as either colour

The first tutorial lesson, Moving a piece, with the pawns that can move marked — A tutorial in five lessons

Screenshots from the Vega Virtual Device, where each feature was played. Testing on a physical Fire TV Stick is still to come.

Why Dice Chess on TV tells the story, What it does tours every feature, and Play the beta says how to try it. The roadmap shows what comes next.

The TV app was built during Build, Ship, Shape: Amazon Developer Hackathon 2026, in a repository started on 21 September 2026. It plays by the rules of Fortemate’s open-source engine, @fortemate/dicechess-engine, which existed before. The friction log records the obstacles we met in Amazon’s Vega SDK along the way.

The code is licensed under AGPL-3.0-only. The app icon and the Fortemate name and logo are not; see Licensing.