Dōbutsu shōgi

Background

Dōbutsu shōgi was invented by women's professional shogi player Madoka Kitao, partially to attract young girls to the game. The pieces were designed by fellow women's professional shogi player Maiko Fujita. The pieces are square, like children's blocks, have cartoon figures of the relevant animal rather than kanji to identify them, and often have dots on the sides and corners of the directions the pieces can move.

Each player starts with four pieces: a Lion (king) in the center of the home row ("forest"), a Giraffe (rook) to the right of the king, an Elephant (bishop) to the left of the king, and a Chick (pawn) in front of the king. Each moves as in standard shogi but is limited to one square per turn. If the Chick advances to the final rank, it promotes to a Hen (tokin), which can move one square any way except diagonally backwards. A chick dropped on the final rank does not promote and may make no further moves until recaptured.

If the players play the same position three turns in a row, the game is a draw. Perpetual check is also a draw. There are two ways to win: capturing the opponent's Lion, or advancing one's own Lion into the promotion zone as long as doing so does not place one's Lion in check.

Origins & Design Philosophy

Dōbutsu shōgi, literally "animal shogi," was conceived as a compact variant of the classic Japanese board game specifically tailored for young children. Its creator, Madoka Kitao, a women's professional shogi player, had a clear motivation: drawing young girls into a game that could otherwise feel intimidating to newcomers. To make the experience approachable and visually engaging, she enlisted fellow women's professional Maiko Fujita to design the playing pieces.

Rather than the traditional kanji characters found on standard shogi tokens, Fujita crafted square, block-like pieces featuring cheerful cartoon animals. The Lion, Giraffe, Elephant, and Chick each carry small dots along their edges and corners, intuitively showing a child which directions that piece can travel. This child-centered design philosophy extends to the game's international branding, where it has been marketed under the playful title "Let's Catch the Lion!"

The result is a variant that preserves the strategic depth of shogi while wrapping it in a package that feels more like a toy than a formal competition.

Rules & Gameplay Mechanics

Each player commands just four pieces arranged on a compact 3×4 board: a Lion serving as the king sits at the center of the home row, flanked by a Giraffe (functioning as the rook) on the right and an Elephant (the bishop) on the left, with a Chick (the pawn) positioned directly ahead. All pieces follow their standard shogi movement patterns but are restricted to a single square per turn. When a Chick advances two squares to reach the far rank—poetically called the "sky"—it promotes into a Hen, gaining the ability to move one square in any direction except diagonally backward, mirroring the gold general.

Captured Hens return to the hand as Chicks, and unlike standard shogi, the usual drop restrictions (no two pawns on a file, no immediate checkmate, no dropping on the final rank) are lifted. A Chick dropped on the final rank, however, cannot promote or move until recaptured. Victory comes either by capturing the opponent's Lion or by marching one's own Lion into the farthest rank, provided it is not left in check. Three consecutive repetitions of the same position, or perpetual check, both result in a draw.

Theoretical Solution & Game Theory

In 2009, mathematician Tetsuro Tanaka applied retrograde analysis to exhaustively map every position reachable from the starting setup, identifying 246,803,167 distinct reachable states (a larger figure of 1,567,925,964 sometimes cited merely counts all possible piece arrangements, including those that never occur in actual play). The result was striking: the second player, called White in shogi terminology, holds a forced win from the very first move, though perfect play may require as many as 78 plies—thirty-nine moves per side.

This means the game opens in a zugzwang, where the player who must move first is at a disadvantage, and by symmetry it is also a Trébuchet position, a full-point zugzwang in which the side to begin movement is destined to lose. Interestingly, every legal first move except capturing the opponent's Chick delays the inevitable defeat by the full 78 plies; grabbing the Chick shortens the resistance to just 76. Beyond the opening, Tanaka's work revealed that the Giraffe is the stronger of the two ranged pieces, and that holding pieces in hand ready to drop confers a significant advantage.

The game resists handicap play, as removing a Giraffe or Elephant gives the weaker side a relatively straightforward forced mate.

Variations & Expansion

Dōbutsu shōgi has inspired larger-scale adaptations that scale up the animal-themed concept. The 5×6 variant, goro goro dōbutsu shōgi (also known as goro goro shogi), expands the army to sixteen pieces per side: three Chicks, two Cats (silvers), two Dogs (golds), and one Lion. Here, Chicks promote to Hens and Cats to empowered Cats, both of which then move identically to the Dog. Promotion zones span the first and last two ranks, and the standard shogi restrictions on drops—such as the two-pawn rule and the prohibition on dropping a pawn with immediate checkmate—return to full effect.

Perpetual check, defined as a four-move repetition, still results in a draw. At the other extreme, a 9×9 version titled "Dobutsu shogi in the Greenwood" (ōkina mori no dōbutsu shōgi) is functionally identical to standard shogi but retains the animal nomenclature. On this larger board, the Elephant and Giraffe regain unlimited range, and two new pieces appear: Boars (lances) and Rabbits (knights), each promoting to empowered versions that move like the Dog, while the Elephant and Giraffe can promote to their dragon-horse and dragon-king equivalents.