Hishigata Shogi

Hishigata Shogi (Diamond Shaped Shogi) is a large board shogi variant played on a 19x19 board like Maka Dai-Dai Shogi. Each player has 31 pieces of 22 different types placed in a diamond shaped starting configuration. The pieces are a subset of the Maka Dai-Dai set (96 pieces of 50 different types), and move and promote in the same way as in Maka Dai-Dai Shogi. By using no pawns and predominantly the more powerful pieces from Maka Dai-Dai Shogi in a much more confronting starting position (only one rank separates the two players) Hishigata Shogi is a much faster and more dynamic game than Maka Dai-Dai Shogi while preserving the flavor of the old large board shogi variant. The game was published at the chessvariants.com homepage in 2005. Se also description of Hishigata Shogi at Wikipedia as part of the Maka Dai-Dai Shogi article.