Show HN: I built a chess explorer that explains strategy instead of just stats(atlaschess.me)
atlaschess.me
Show HN: I built a chess explorer that explains strategy instead of just stats
https://www.atlaschess.me/
I built this because I got tired of Stockfish giving me evaluations (+0.5) without explaining the actual plan.
Most opening explorers focus on statistics (Win/Loss/Draw). I wanted a tool that explains the strategic intent behind the moves (e.g., "White plays c4 to clamp down on d5" vs just "White plays c4").
The Project:
Comprehensive Database: I’ve mapped and annotated over 3,500 named opening variations. It covers everything from main lines (Ruy Lopez, Sicilian) to deep sidelines.
Strategic Visualization: The UI highlights key squares and draws arrows based on the textual explanation, linking the logic to the board state dynamically.
Hybrid Architecture: For the 3,500+ core lines, it serves my proprietary strategic data. For anything deeper/rarer, it seamlessly falls back to the Lichess Master API so the explorer remains functional 20 moves deep.
Stack: Next.js (App Router), MongoDB Atlas for the graph data, and Arcjet for security/rate-limiting.
It is currently in Beta. I am working on expanding the annotated coverage, but the main theoretical landscape is mapped.
Feedback on the UI/UX or the data structure is welcome.
5 comments
It would be nice to see more than 2 opening moves before getting login blocked.
I could not even see 1 opening move. Clicking on one from the home page shows me the login.
Thanks for the feedback, since it's in BETA, there are some bugs with it that I'm working on right now, feel free to check out later when I fix the issues
Thanks for your feedback, I'll work on it, you can try again after some time, it might be then helpful for you
Cool. I wanted to build something exactly like this!