Xiangqi (Chinese Chess) with AI

This project is a web-based Xiangqi (Chinese Chess) application that allows users to play against different AI opponents. It features a modern, clean interface and a decoupled front-end and back-end architecture.

Features

• Play Xiangqi: A fully functional Xiangqi board with all standard rules implemented.
• Selectable AI Opponents: Choose to play against different AI agents with varying difficulty.
  • Random Agent: A simple agent that makes random legal moves.
  • Minimax (Expert) Agent: A more advanced agent using Minimax search with Alpha-Beta Pruning, Iterative Deepening, and a heuristic evaluation function with Piece-Square Tables.
• Modern UI: A clean, responsive user interface built with React.
• Separated Frontend/Backend: A robust architecture that separates the user interface (React) from the game logic and AI (Python/FastAPI).

Technology Stack

• Frontend:
  • React
  • TypeScript
  • Vite
• Backend:
  • Python
  • FastAPI
  • Uvicorn

Project Structure

The project is organized into two main directories:

• /front-end: Contains the React/TypeScript user interface.
• /back-end: Contains the Python/FastAPI server, which hosts the game logic and AI agents.

Getting Started

To run the project locally, you will need to start both the back-end server and the front-end application.

1. Running the Backend

First, navigate to the back-end directory and set up the Python environment.

cd back-end

# It is recommended to create a virtual environment
python -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate  # On Windows, use `.venv\Scripts\activate`

# Install dependencies
pip install -r requirements.txt

# Run the server
uvicorn main:app --reload

The back-end server will be running on http://127.0.0.1:8000.

2. Running the Frontend

In a separate terminal, navigate to the front-end directory.

cd front-end

# Install dependencies
npm install

# Run the development server
npm run dev

The front-end application will be available at http://localhost:5173 (or another port if 5173 is busy). Open this URL in your browser to play the game.