Janggi

Janggi (including romanizations changgi and jangki), sometimes called Korean chess, is a strategy board game popular in Korea. The game derived from xiangqi (Chinese chess) and is very similar to it, including the starting position of the pieces, and the 9×10 gameboard, but without the xiangqi "river" dividing the board horizontally at the middle.

Janggi is played on a board nine lines wide by ten lines long. The game is sometimes fast-paced due to the jumping cannons and the long-range elephants, but professional games most often last over 150 moves and so are typically slower than those of Western chess.

In 2009, the first world janggi tournament was held in Harbin, People's Republic of China.

Janggi in Korean culture

In Korea one will often see older men crowding around a single janggi board while two men play for small amounts of money. These games are played year round, especially in city parks in Seoul. Janggi is occasionally played as a gambling game, and it is currently less popular in Korea than the strategy game Baduk (Go).