If Nintendo’s very own Wii Chess wasn’t all you were hoping for, perhaps the latest third party effort will be enough to satiate your need for a little virtual board game action. Destination Software’s dramatically titled Chess Crusade will be released in North America next month on July 22.

Sporting a more impressive, fairytale-esque looks compared to its no frills rival on the console, Wii Crusade, it seems, will feature animations when players take one another’s pieces. Doesn’t look too bad actually.

Both it and a Nintendo DS version will launch on July 22 for $19.99 and $14.99 respectively, but we can’t help thinking that, especially for the Wii version, a WiiWare release might have been more suitable.