CombatChess vs DelveKin
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both games, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
CombatChess
Experience chess with a twist: captures lead to real-time pixel brawls where the winner claims the square. Manage action cards strategically to win fights and defend your pieces. Features a robust chess engine and arcade-style combat mechanics.
- Real-time pixel brawls for captures
- Action cards for strategic combat
- Persistent damage on pieces
- Six-button arcade combat system
- King can fight to avoid checkmate
- Full-rule chess engine (Stockfish)
- Turn-based online multiplayer
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It's chess. With fists. Combat Chess is real, full-rules chess until a capture is contested. Then both pieces drop into a real-time brawl, and the winner keeps the square. No piece goes quietly. Not even the king. ACTION CARDS: FIGHT FOR THE SQUARE You start every match with 3 Action Cards. When your piece is captured, spend one to force a fight instead of just losing it. Win the brawl and the capture is repelled your piece holds the square and the attacker is removed. Cards are spent win or lose and never refill mid-match, so card management is a whole extra layer of strategy. Run dry, and captures land like ordinary chess. FIGHTS THAT MATTER - Fighting power scales with chess value: pawns brawl at 75 HP, knights and bishops at 125, rooks at 175, queens at a monstrous 275, kings at 300. - Damage persists for the ENTIRE match. Wound the queen now, hunt her down later a health bar follows every piece that has fought. - A pawn can topple a queen. It just takes near-flawless play. SIX-BUTTON ARCADE COMBAT - Left punch (fast jab) and right punch (slow, heavy cross). - Side-matched blocking read the tell and guard the correct side to absorb 80% of the hit. - Timed dodges perfect timing negates all damage and charges your meter. - A stamina system that punishes button-mashing. Burn out and you're exhausted: unable to act and taking 1.5x damage. - Land perfect dodges to unlock the SUPER a single power shot worth 2.5x a heavy punch. Spam loses. Reads win. THE KING NEVER FALLS QUIETLY - In check, you can move out of danger or spend a card to send your king to fight the checking piece directly. - Checkmate isn't automatically the end. It triggers a mandatory final fight: your king duels the mating piece at 300 HP, no card needed. Win the last stand and the mate is broken. This cuts both ways: to beat you, your opponent must finish the job in the ring. A REAL CHESS ENGINE UNDERNEATH - Complete standard chess: castling, en passant, promotion, check, checkmate, and every standard draw rule. - Powered by the Stockfish engine, tunable from 600 to 3190 Elo - friendly beginner to superhuman, with a strength slider for every difficulty in Settings. - Single-player works fully offline. Sound and haptics are yours to toggle. CHALLENGE FRIENDS ONLINE - Turn-based multiplayer through Game Center: invite friends, run several matches at once, and take your time. - Get notified when an opponent moves, captures, or starts a fight with daily reminders before the 4-day forfeit window closes a stalled match. - Built for turn-based play: when you contest a capture, the fight resolves instantly on your own device against a computer-controlled version of your opponent's piece fighting with its true HP and power, including damage it already carries. No waiting around, and your opponent sees a full recap on their turn. EVERY MATCH ON RECORD - Match history with wins, losses, draws, win rate, streaks, per-difficulty records, fight stats, and your biggest upset.
DelveKin
Become the Dungeon Master in this charming strategy game. Design your dungeon with rooms, traps, and monsters to battle invading heroes. Take direct control of monsters in turn-based combat and unlock new defenses as you progress.
- Build custom dungeons with rooms, monsters, and traps
- Command monsters in turn-based battles
- Set strategic traps to hinder heroes
- Unlock new monsters, traps, and rooms
- Face diverse hero combinations and threats
- Engage in replayable Deep Delve challenges
- Progress through a full campaign and raids
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The heroes are coming. Build a dungeon worthy of stopping them! DelveKin is a charming dungeon defense strategy game where you take the role of the Dungeon Master. Design your defenses, place traps, command monsters, and battle invading heroes across handcrafted encounters and replay-able dungeon challenges. BUILD YOUR DUNGEON - Choose rooms with different layouts and tactical advantages, then fill them with monsters and traps. Every placement matters as heroes advance deeper into your dungeon. COMMAND YOUR MONSTERS - Take direct control during turn-based battles. Move across the battlefield, launch basic attacks, unleash special abilities, and combine your monsters' strengths to overcome each group of heroes. SET CLEVER TRAPS - Slow heroes with snares, strike from the walls with arrow slits, or punish careless movement with hidden hazards. Traps can shape the battlefield and create opportunities for your monsters. GROW YOUR ARSENAL - Unlock new monsters, traps, rooms, and powerful bosses as you progress. Earn experience, level up your defenses, and build stronger dungeon teams for the challenges ahead. FACE NEW HEROES - Each stage introduces different hero combinations, abilities, and tactical threats. Adapt your dungeon to withstand knights, mages, rogues, clerics, and other determined adventurers. VENTURE INTO DEEP DELVE - Put your dungeon building skills to the ultimate test in Deep Delve, a replay-able 20-depth challenge where every run is different. Build a run specific roster, recruit and replace monsters and traps, choose powerful upgrades, evolve your boss, and see how deep your dungeon can survive. CONTINUE INTO DUNGEON RAIDS - Complete the main campaign and enter Dungeon Raids, where increasingly dangerous hero parties push your defenses even further. CHARMING ART STYLE - DelveKin features expressive characters, lively battle animations, and a playful fantasy world. Play the opening chapters for free. A single Premium unlock opens the full campaign, additional progression, Dungeon Raids, and Deep Delve. Build carefully. Fight cleverly. Protect your dungeon.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: CombatChess at none against DelveKin's 1. DelveKin's advantage is update cadence (every 4 days vs every 9 days). On price, rating, ratings volume and ads there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Both are free to download. DelveKin sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. CombatChess asks for nothing beyond the download.
On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 5.0 for CombatChess against 4.9 for DelveKin. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 6 and 7 respectively.
CombatChess ships an update every 9 days, DelveKin every 4 days. The most recent releases landed on October 31, 2026 and November 6, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | CombatChess | DelveKin |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 5.0 (6 ratings) — better | 4.9 (7 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 100.0% of reviews | — |
| Number of ratings | 6 | 7 — better |
| Update frequency | Every 9 days | Every 4 days — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Free — better | Freemium |
| Devices | iPhone | iPhone, iPad — better |
| Requires iOS | 17.0 | 16.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 129 MB | 72 MB |
| Age rating | 9+ | 9+ |
| Developer | PUNCHMAN, LLC | Cinder Code LLC |
Customer experience
CombatChess
DelveKin
In-app purchases
CombatChess
No in-app purchases
DelveKin
- Premium Upgrade$4.99









