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I wouldn't go that far, those variants are 'new', at least to this page,
so they get played more. The question is which variants gets played after
they are off the front page...

If 10x8 (10 wide, 8 deep) which is what I assume is the subject is dead, it
is because you can't find the board anywhere.  Anytime you deviate from
8x8, you have problems.  This is why I personally propose 8x8 be the
starting point for anything.

As far as Seirawan Chess goes, it is on an 8x8 board.  I believe it has
issues also, but less then Capablanca.

8x8 is interesting Chessboard size to last. Long-reigning Shogi has 81
spaces, Xiangqi 90. Now 64/81 and 64/90 are 79% and 71%.  They get a lot
of mileage in Western Chess from Chaturanga to Shatranj to Mad Queen out
of board about 3/4 size of Eastern Chess. '8x10' would still be
small compared to Shogi and Xiangqi. The ''holy grail'' of Brown in Centennial Chess is '10x10', decimal chess, but no one satisfactorily deals with the Pawns at that size. May 2008 here Carillo traces through history '8x10's from 1617 Carrera's, 1923 Capablanca's, 1978 Janus, 1996 Falcon, 2004 CRandomC, 2006 Mastodon, 2008 MCRandomC, among others.

Maybe one way of handling the pawns on a 10x10 board is to make the pawns a little stronger. One idea that comes to mind is using Winther's scorpion pawn to make the lowly pawn more powerful. Another piece that is weaker on the 10x10 board is the knight; Strong, in Opulent Chess handled this problem by having the knight also being able to move like a rook, but only square (knight + wazir). I myself would make it so the knights could also jump exactly three squares diagonally (over other pieces, if needed), or have it so one knight can also jump three squares diagonally, and the other knight can jump three squares like a rook.

A lot of 10x10 variants were proposed in the 10 contest.

Slanted Escalator's Crab Pawn has a nice strengthener too, moving
diagonally forward without capture, mode for 10x10 as well as the need
Short fulfills on the Slanted Escalator board, to wind easily up the Escalator part of the board.

| If 10x8 (10 wide, 8 deep) which is what I assume is the subject 
| is dead, it is because you can't find the board anywhere.  

This is not true at all. 10x8 boards and Chess sets are even sold
commercially, and a lot of people play 10x8 variants. There are even
internet servers dedicated to it. It is just that it is not allowed on
this forum to mention where. This has to do more with being brain dead,
than with the game being dead, though.

Where I live, virtually every Chess board has a 10x10 board on the back
(for playing draughts). For instance, I have a very nice one where the
squares are wood inlays of light and dark wood. If I want to play a 10x8
game, I can simply cover the two back ranks by a piece of cardboard or
clip a small wooden plank over it.

Of course with Falcon Chess 8x10 we disagree any '8x10 is dead', but to
contrary the obvious logical expansion, without ruining Pawn play, and
still below Shogi's 81 and Xiangqi's 90. 8x10 is surely correct rather
than 10x10, but who can definitely rule out Courier 8x12? Thousands of
oddball forms do not hide logical evolutions, as happened between
Shatranj and Modern -- be they today Fischer Random, specific Carrera
arrays, Falcon, Mastodon, or saving Mutator on 8x8 such as
later-introduced pieces. I mentioned more than once standard ubiquitous
European draughts boards 10x10 at Chessboard Math and ProblemThemes. This
thread became topic of board sizes 64,80,100 generally. Sam 
Trenholme, who started it, is noted for his own mid-1990's website of
pre-existing  Chess forms, not encouraging proliferation for its own sake.
We would be interested where any 80's are being played besides Brainking,
in order eventually to seek open inclusion of Falcon Chess there. Jeremy
Good's absence removes the only Falcon Chess advocate besides ourselves
developing work-ups. What about the mere existence of new Play servers without
specific addresses being named?

Sam Trenholme: ' ... looks like 8x10 Chess (Capablanca chess, etc.) is
dead. ...'

... must be a zombie - you can't kill it. ;-)

What happened to Gothic Chess? Looks like some effort was put into it and
now it is floundering or dieing. Anyone know?

Well, still I am continuing developing 10x8 chess engines for my own,
because the number of supporters has nearly vanished. The SMIRF GUI now is
supporting seven languages. There are plans to write a UCI-2 related
protocol based 10x8 engine, but it is proceeding very slow, because of
missing donations for such a donation ware project. Thus, when there is no
public support, there will be no public new engine.