Welcome to the 19th Century, where chess is a gentleman's duel and defense is an afterthought. In the Romantic Era, kings are dragged into the center of the board, pieces are sacrificed with reckless abandon, and the only goal is a beautiful checkmate.

Imagine sitting in a smoky London café in 1851. You don't play to grind out a small advantage. You play for glory. This block will test your attacking intuition, your nerve in chaotic positions, and your ability to spot brilliant mating nets when everything is hanging.

The relentless attacking party of the 19th century is over. Wilhelm Steinitz has broken chess down into a rigorous science, proving that premature attacks fail against solid defense. This is the birth of modern chess strategy.

Gone are the days of baseless sacrifices. Instead, you'll learn to build unbreakable pawn structures, slowly restrict your opponent's pieces, and accumulate small advantages until they crack under pressure. Welcome to the dawn of positional mastery.

Just when the classical rules of chess seemed set in stone, a group of chess rebels turned everything upside down. Why put your pawns in the center where they can be attacked, when you can control it from afar with your pieces?

In the Hypermodern Era, you'll learn to invite your opponent to build a massive pawn center, only to tear it apart from the flanks. It's a style built on provocation, flexibility, and tension. Get ready to bend the rules.

Chess has evolved. The wild attacks of the Romantics, the rigid rules of the Scientists, and the flexible trickery of the Hypermoderns have merged into one highly demanding standard: Universal Play.

The Modern Era is about being able to do it all. You can't just be a good attacker or a good defender anymore. Here, you'll step into the minds of the post-war World Champions. These players squeezed blood from a stone, prepared ruthlessly, and crushed opponents with devastating completeness.

Welcome to the grandest stages in chess. The lights are blinding, the prize pool is massive, and every single opponent you face is a super-grandmaster. This is where modern practical chess is brutally tested.

From the fierce closed-door intensity of Linares to the modern spectator spectacles of Tata Steel and Norway Chess, you'll be dropped straight into the critical moments that determined tournament victory. It's time to test your nerves and calculate under tournament pressure.

Everything comes down to this. Months of intense opening preparation, grueling psychological warfare, and suffocating tension. The World Chess Championship is the ultimate crucible.

When you're fighting for the crown, you can't afford a single mistake. This block places you in the critical middlegames of the most famous title matches in history. You'll need to control your nerves, manage risk perfectly, and strike when the moment presents itself. Will you take the title?

What does it feel like to sit across the board from a World Champion? It's terrifying. Every minor inaccuracy is punished, the pressure is constant, and survival feels impossible.

In this unit, you're not the hero. You're the underdog. You'll switch perspectives and play against the champions. You'll learn the vital art of defensive resilience: parrying Fischer's precision, surviving Tal's attacks, and breaking free of Karpov's suffocating grip. Find the defensive resources when you need them most.

Forget human intuition. Forget psychological warfare. In the realm of engines, the only thing that matters is absolute, brutal objective truth.

Stockfish, AlphaZero, and Leela have shown us that we don't understand the game nearly as well as we thought we did. They sacrifice pawns for long-term initiative, push flank pawns fearlessly, and defend with alien-like precision. Learn from the silicon monsters and upgrade your calculation to machine-like accuracy.

Memorizing opening moves will only get you so far. The real game begins exactly out of the opening, when you look at your pawn structure and have to decide: 'What now?'

This unit bridges the gap between opening theory and middlegame execution. Whether you're dealing with the tension of the French, the razor-sharp attacks of the Sicilian, or the slow maneuvering of the Ruy Lopez, you'll learn the typical plans and pawn breaks required to seize control.

You don't need to win a World Championship to leave an immortal legacy. Some players changed the way we understand the game simply through the sheer originality of their minds.

From Akiba Rubinstein's flawless endgame artistry, to Levon Aronian's joyful chaos, to Viktor Korchnoi's bitter, brilliant defense, these masters carved out entirely unique identities. By stepping into their wildly different playstyles, you'll vastly expand your own creative horizons over the board.