Jieqi

Jieqi (in Chinese: 揭棋, in Vietnamese: Cờ Úp, probably other names in English: uncovering / dark / unveiling chess/xiangqi) is a Xiangqi (Chinese chess) variant rising star when the number of players grows rapidly, especially in China and Vietnam.

Rules

At the starting point excepting the King, all 15 pieces of each side will be covered (usually by small plastic covers or simply put them face down to hide their symbols) and randomly put on original positions. Those covered pieces are called Jieqi or dark or covered ones

A Jieqi piece should do the first move as the original piece in which it is located. For example, the covered piece on the bottom left corner (which is a Rook position in Xiangqi) must do the first move as a Rook. That is why covered pieces are also called “fake” based on which original pieces' locations they are on. For example, the mentioned covered piece (on the bottom left corner) is called "fake Rook". After the first move, it will be revealed/uncovered to show its real material (for example, the fake Rook revealed to be a Pawn). From now on, that (unveiled) piece will move as its real chess type (for example, the new Pawn will move as a Pawn). The revealing is similar to chess promotion but in this case, players cannot control which new types the pieces can become. We call it “revelation” to distinguish from promotion

Revealed Advisors and Elephants can move freely without any limitation by area as they were in Xiangqi. It means they can appear out of palaces and can cross the river to attack opposite Kings

Kings are still limited in palaces, Pawns could be revealed anywhere but can go ahead only when they are still in their homeland and could go sidely after crossing the river

Capture: covered pieces could capture or be captured as usual. However, after being captured, they may still remain in covered status, no one knows which real materials the captured covered pieces are

https://www.chessprogramming.org/Jeiqi CC BY-SA 3.0

Clarification

Currently, contrary to https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/揭棋 neither player can see what piece has been captured. This may change in the future.