As noted in the film Searching for Bobby Fischer, each player can effectively think of himself or herself as the king. The object of chess is to capture the other side's king, so basically you protect the king as if it is yourself. Fortunately you are not alone on the battlefield. 15 other pieces exist to protect your King and to attack the other side. The bad news, of course, is that the other side has the same 16 pieces.
If you have never played before, the pieces and their moves can seem very confusing. Most of the movement done by a chess piece is extremely simple. The 16 pieces that make up each side are:
8 Pawns
2 Rooks (sometimes called "castles")
2 Knights
2 Bishops
1 Queen
1 King
If you have a chess board and pieces available, getting them out and going through these steps as you read might be very helpful. Each game begins with the setup of each side's pieces. Each player places all 16 of his pieces on the two rows closest to him or her. Before you begin a game, make sure that a black square is in the bottom left-hand corner (this is a rule that keeps all games uniform). As we explore where each piece begins the game, we will also examine how each piece moves. To begin, let us define a move. Each turn a player can move only one piece. That piece must follow the rules for how that piece is able to move (see below for each piece's abilities). You can move your piece to any open space, unless it is obstructed by another piece. Any piece can "take" an opponent's piece by moving to the square on which the opponent's piece sits, as long as your piece can legally make it to that square. If you take, or capture, the other player's piece, it is removed from the board for the remainder of the game.