Hey everyone! I’m Kelly Willoughby, the lead producer at Ripstone Games. We’re a British developer and publisher, and we’ve got a whole bunch of PlayStation games in our repertoire. You might know the Pure series, including Pure Chess, Pure Pool and Pure Hold’em, or maybe titles like Stick it to the Man and Knytt Underground.

So here’s the deal: We’ve been secretly working on a brand new title created by our internal development team that we’d love to share with you today. We’re super excited to reveal that Chess Ultra, a sequel to our original 2012 hit Pure Chess, is coming to PS4 and PS VR this spring.

Chess? YES!

Chess Ultra is a massive step up from the original Pure Chess for the Ripstone team. Not only is the game going to be available in stunning 4K for PlayStation 4 Pro players, but PlayStation VR owners will be able to play the game in virtual reality. We’re super excited about that, as you might have gathered!

Each of the Chess Ultra environments look absolutely stunning in 4K, as you can see from the screenshots and the teaser trailer, and the chess sets themselves are just as slick. We’ve worked really hard to make every inch of Chess Ultra shine and we think you’re really going to get the wow factor when you boot up the game. Running at a silky smooth 60 frames per second with textures beautifully rendered using PBR (physical based rendering) this really is something special. Developing the game from the ground up with our internal team has allowed us to make the most beautiful chess game ever seen!

And of course, there are all the features you’d expect from a top quality chess game, and plenty more on top of that. There’s a huge amount of single-player content, including ten different AI levels, multiple environments and a variety of stunning chess sets.

Once you’ve shown the AI what you’re made of, you can always take the action online, and play against friends and other Chess Ultra players from around the world. We’ve got plenty of game modes to keep you and your friends entertained online.

If you’d like to see the game in action right this second, you’re in luck! We’re currently hosting a special livestream on Twitch, where you can play Chess Ultra against a Grandmaster by entering chess commands into the chat, and also ask questions about the game. How cool is that!

That’s everything we’re ready to share right now, but rest assured we have some big surprises up our sleeves that we can’t wait to shout about!

As the first internally developed game for PlayStation from Ripstone Games, Chess Ultra is extremely special to all of us here, and we can’t wait for you to get your hands on it this spring. Expect to hear from me again soon!