Press Kit

Overview

Metamate is the first chess training piece. Designed in Geneva, made in Switzerland, it replaces a standard piece on the board to transform how players improve. Its principle: mimicking the abilities of neighbouring pieces. Strong when surrounded, vulnerable when isolated, it acts as a strategic limiter that forces the player to calculate, improvise and adapt — where theoretical preparation and memorisation dominate the modern game. In a filmed interview, Bobby Fischer once suggested the idea of finding another piece — an offhand remark, never followed up. Dozens of people took those words and created variants. Decades later, a Genevan designer took him at his word — and is perhaps the only one to have gone so far while remaining so close to the essence of the game.

What Metamate means for chess

Chess lives a paradox: it shines on screens, gathers millions of players, fascinates crowds — and yet, its essence withers under the weight of preparation and repetition. Humans continue to play even though artificial intelligence has long surpassed them — but they persist, because the beauty of chess lies in the story they write together, not in mathematical perfection. For a hundred and fifty years, no new piece has established itself on the board. The last major evolution dates back to the 15th century, with the appearance of the modern queen and castling. Metamate proposes the first micro-evolution since — not by replacing chess, but by layering onto the existing game to elevate its practice.

How the piece works

The Meta has neither its own movement nor memory. It copies the abilities of allied pieces located one square away. Surrounded by a rook and a bishop, it moves like a rook or a bishop. Isolated, it cannot move. Before each game, the player chooses to replace one of their standard pieces with a Meta. The physical piece is composed of two elements connected by magnets: by rotating the body on the base, the player changes configuration, a simple gesture that materialises the evolution during the game. Five levels exist, from Meta-Pawn (two copy directions, allies only) to Meta-Queen (eight directions, allies and enemies). The piece evolves through captures: each enemy capture raises it one level, transforming its very nature. By training with the Meta, the player develops heightened awareness and deeper reading of positions. Then, when the real match comes, the limiter disappears — and the classical board suddenly seems simpler, more readable.

Swiss Made manufacturing

Metamate is designed and manufactured in Geneva. The piece is modelled on Shapr3D and produced via 3D printing on a Bambu Lab — an artisanal cycle where each prototype is printed at night, tested in the morning, corrected in the evening. The magnetic system — embedded neodymium magnets — has been iterated dozens of times to achieve the right balance between assembly strength and rotation fluidity.

Who uses Metamate

Metamate has been presented to the greatest chess players in the world. In April 2025, at the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour in Paris — the circuit co-founded by Magnus Carlsen —, Alban Vogel handed the piece personally to thirteen top-50 players, including Magnus Carlsen, Hikaru Nakamura, Fabiano Caruana and Dommaraju Gukesh, reigning World Champion. In summer 2025, the Biel International Chess Festival hosted Metamate. The creator played his variant against Grandmasters Rinat Jumabayev and Vladimir Fedoseev. In Switzerland, six partner groups and clubs use the piece, alongside competitive players and children in training. Over five hundred test games have been played, involving more than three hundred testers.

Alban Vogel — the creator

Alban Vogel is a UX designer based in Geneva. Between freelance mandates and his work for a Lausanne startup, he turned to 3D modelling in 2023 — out of curiosity, with no specific goal. It was a question posed one evening, between Geneva and Lausanne, that triggered everything: What if humanity, in creating chess, had omitted a piece — which one would it be? An occasional player, he dedicated over two years to developing Metamate alone: design, prototyping, manufacturing, legal filings, club outreach and presentations to professional players. No investor, no factory, no team — with a 3D printer and a conviction.

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