Moving, capturing and whose turn it is

Try it on the board

One move at a time, always

Sente moves, Gote moves, and so on to the end of the game. A move is moving one piece - or, from lesson 5 onwards, dropping one from your hand. Never both, and never two pieces.

There is no double pawn step, no castling and no en passant. Shogi has fewer exceptions than chess; what it has of its own is the drop.

Capturing is taking the square

To capture, move your piece onto the square the enemy piece stands on, as if it were empty. The captured piece leaves the board and goes into your hand - and from then on it is yours.

The shogi pawn captures straight ahead, not diagonally. That is the difference that catches chess players out: two pawns facing each other are locked, and neither can take the other.

Blocked pieces

Rook, bishop and lance stop at the first piece in their path. If it is yours they stop just before it; if it is your opponent's they may capture it and stop there. Only the knight ignores what is in the way, because it jumps.

Note that your own piece in front of the rook blocks it exactly as much as an enemy one does. A good part of the shogi opening is simply clearing lines for your own long pieces.