Man vs. Machine vs. Machine vs. ...

Over the years I have owned several different chess computers ranging from the very weak to Grandmaster strength. All of the early ones were dedicated units. Some were new and some I picked up second hand.

My first was some kind of Boris Diplomat that looked something like this. It was a very weak unit as I remember and I would estimate it would be rated around 1000.


Soon moved on to a Chess Challenger such as the the shown here. I don’t remember if it was model 7, 8 or 9 but I remember it being around 1400-1500 and the green cover was always bubbling up and it became hard to play on. I don’t remember what happened to these first two units, but I no longer have them.

I figured I needed to upgrade to a higher strength machine. I remember that it was the first time I ever ordered something over the phone (this was before the internet was invented by Al Gore). I looked at all the options and decided to purchase a Novag constellation from The Canadian Chess Computer Warehouse in Montreal. I had never heard of the company before so I was nervous it wouldn’t arrive but it did. I must say I was very happy with my Novag Constellation for many years. I think it was advertised around 1800 and therefore higher then my rating at the time I got it. It was my steady playing partner for several years as my rating improved. One of it faults was that it never learned from its defeats so that once I beat it in a certain line than every time after that, if we entered that line, I could repeat the earlier game and beat it again. This forced me to vary my openings or I would end up replaying games over and over. Even though I quit playing chess for many years I brought it with me when I moved to Alberta. Recently I took it out of the box for the first time in ten years.

When I started playing chess again I soon realized I would need to purchase a chess program for my personal computer if I wanted to be competitive with everyone else. When I quit playing chess in the early 90’s I didn’t own a computer and I don’t think affordable programs were that strong at the time. The Fritz program seemed the best for me so I tried the Fritz10 program and I must say it is an incredible program. It’s good to have your own grandmaster to analyse positions. I can remember trying to study my games years ago on the Novag Constellation and while it would catch any major blunders, I sure I missed many finer points. I was hoping when I visited PEI this summer I would be able to find my old games and put them through Fritz and see what wes revealed, but alas they had been tossed a couple of years ago.

Last year the kids spotted a Go 1650L at a garage sale. I picked it up for a cheap price. I assume the 1650 is supposed to be it’s rating but it seems much weaker to me in the few games I’ve played with it.


Finally I bought the kids the Chessmaster game for the Nintendo DS system. It claims that the top rating is 1850 and from the few games that I played against it I think that that is probably close.



So what I’ve decided to do is hold a tournament with all the programs and computers I still have and see what happens. The competitors are as follows:
Fritz 10 (Set at 2000)
Fritz 10 (Set at 1900)
Chessmaster DS (1850)
Human (currently underrated at approx 1800)
Novag Constellation (1700-1800)
Go 1650L (1650? )

So far I’ve played a few of the games and ran into a few problems. First I had to chose a time setting that wouldn’t take too long but still give a good game. I chose an active time of 30min per player per game. Then I had to find the manuals for the Novag and Go units so I could set the times appropriately. I was able to find the Novag manual on the internet but the Go unit was a little harder as I could only find the Spanish instructions and had to translate them as best I could. The problem is the time settings are different for all of them. When I played the Chessmaster DS against the Novag it was a good game - Novag lost the exchange but was able to trap the Chessmaster Queen and win it for the Rook. So Novag was probably winning but when the Novag’s time ran out on the Nintendo unit Chessmaster claimed a win and that was the end of the game. I guess I will have to adjust the time settings on the DS and replay the game.

An interesting game shown below where I couldn’t figure out how to stop the connected passed pawns and win with my extra rook.

machine tourney terry-2000b.pgn



Edited comments: I just remembered that I have a couple of other chess playing computer programs. First is the Chess game for Playstaion. I can't recall playing a complete game against it but I doubt that it is very strong.

I also have the Chess Titans Program that came with Windows Vista on my laptop. I know that it has 10 levels and on the lower levels it is extremely easy to beat. I've beaten it on level 8 but haven't finished a game on level 10 yet.



And finally I forgot about the Chessmaster 9000 program that I picked up for $10 in the sale bin at Staples a coupl of years ago. It is a great program for choosing various computer opponents with different personalities and a wide range of strengths. I think I will add it to the tournament.

Edmonton Jr Tournament

Just got back from the X-mas Jr tournament in Edmonton. Both my kids decided they wanted to play this weekend but it was a close call. One flipped a coin to decide and the other was influenced by the guaranteed door prize. They were both very rusty, not having played since last April, but both did OK and I don't think they will lose any rating points.

I've been wondering if I been doing the best things I can to help them improve. Should I show them openings, endgames, or tactics? Should I try to teach them in a formal way or encourage them to play online. I know I shouldn't tell them to play each other because that causes nothing but problems. Whenever I do try to show them something I'm not sure if I am doing it effectively. I always thought teaching would be an easy thing to do (you know, "those who can, do; those who can't, teach") but now I realize that teaching requires a special set of skills and a lot of patience. Plus, the best teaching only occurs when there is a corresponding strong desire to learn.

Random Chess Predictions:
1.FIDE will change the qualifications once again before the next world champion is decided.
2. The CFC will continue to alienate a large number of it's members no matter what they do.
3. Canada's next Olympiad team could be much stronger if GMs Nakamura, Spraggett, and Kovalyov are eligible and willing to play, but that won't happen.
4. E4 Effort will win the WBX Team tournament in Edmonton next weekend, even though another team with an IM and underrated juniors joined today. Board winners as follows
Board 1 winner IM Proper followed by Sasata and Hansen (he didn't get a IM title for nothing)
Board 2 winner Jamin Gluckie followed by Me (not me but Me, because I won't be there)
Board 3 Peter Thompson followed by Zeggelaar (both teams have stacked board 3)

Meteors over Lloydminster

As anyone who seen the news in Canada in the last two weeks probably knows, there was a huge meteor event over Lloydminster Nov 20th. I have this Friday off and was planning on going Meteorite hunting near Lone Rock to find pieces of the huge fireball that light up the sky over most of western Canada last month. I was looking out my office window at the time to make sure my command start on my vehicle worked when the whole parking lot lit up as bright as day for a couple of seconds. One of the workers at my company was driving home through the area that evening and had his passenger windshield shatter when it happened, either from a fragment or the sonic boom. The scientists have located over a dozen pieces and have narrowed down the search area where they expect thousands of fragments landed. Unfortunately it finally snowed today, so I doubt if I would be able to find anything if I went.


View from Edmonton


View from closer vantage point



Fragment embedded in frozen pond


Random Chess thoughts: (since this is supposed to be a chess blog)

1. Vote for Eric. He deserves it. Canadian Chess Player of the Year

2. My kids said they want to play in the Edmonton Christmas Kids tournament. Maybe chess is not just for nerds.

3. The FIDE world championship cycle is becoming more of a joke every time they alter their rules. I would prefer the candidate matches that they had twenty years ago.

4. There is no need for drug testing in chess and I hope the GM's of the world follow Shirov and support Ivanchuk over FIDE. Although I'm sure some of my opponent are hyped up on energy drinks!

5. FIDE's forfit rule for being late is unreasonable. I know I've been late before and when my opponent is late I would still prefer to play the game rather than win by forfit.

Who are You?

I was curious as to who, if anybody, was visiting my blog so I put a live trafic feed at the bottom. I was surprised to see so many hits from all over Canada and even one from Finland! I was sure there was only three other people who read my site but when "The Big Ape" from Med Hat left me a comment I went to his blog and copied his idea using Feedjit. If you visiting don't be shy about leaving a comment.

On to chess. This week I played a number of games against Fritz lowered to 2000. Almost all the games were horrible. I think when there is no ego to protect then a person’s game suffers. I'm sure many of my blunders would not have been made against a human opponent because I would have been more careful, so as not to be embarrassed. When the computer beats me I don't feel the same crushing level of defeat that a human opponent can inflict. I find the same thing happens to me in online blitz games when I have no fear of losing face because I don’t know who I’m playing. Two weeks ago I played a series of blitz games against an opponent and after losing the first game badly I played several really good games and won in spectacular fashion. My opponent strongly suggested my play from game 2 on did not seem “natural” to him and that I had some outside “help”. If this was a face to face game I would have been highly offended but as I did not know him, other than that he was from the USA, I could have not cared less what he thought and so I just left. I should try to find those game if I can and look to see if my play was really as good as he thought.
Here is my last Fritz active game played while my son was doing his Judo class.


2008-01-01 Fritz.pgn


I think I played the ending rather well but I did miss a winning plan that Fritz revealed when I looked at it tonight.

Fritz vs Chaisson

This week while waiting for my daughter at the swimming pool I took the laptop and played four 25 min games against Fritz. To make it fair I lowered the computer's strength. According to the directions it's strength was 2000, but it didn't seem that strong to me. I drew the first game, blundered the second and won the third and here is the fourth.

Fritz2000 2008-11-25.pgn


Edited comment: I 've played several more games since then and I lost every one, most with stupid blunders. I seem to be playing like its a blitz game.

Chess Is For Nerds?!

Last weekend my company held it’s Christmas party in Edmonton at the Cree River Resort and Casino. There happened to be a kid’s chess tournament going on that Sunday at the Edmonton Chess Club and I figured my two kids would enjoy playing in it so I signed them up. They had always wanted to play in other tournaments in Edmonton and sometimes last year we specifically drove into Edmonton for some of these junior tournaments. I was surprised when they both told me that they didn’t want to play chess anymore and that chess was for nerds! ........Ouch. I didn’t want to push them into the tournament, so we spent the afternoon wandering around the mall and then driving home.

How did chess get such a bad rap? Two years ago they wanted to play in tournaments all the time and they did very well. My daughter had a scholastic rating that put her in the top 10 in the country for girls in grade 4 and my son came second for grade 2 at the Alberta Provincial Chess Challenge. Now they don’t want to play. I know this is partly because they didn’t do so well in their last tournament, which was the 2008 Alberta Chess Challenge. My boy was very sick that day and was so drugged up on cold medicine he couldn’t stay awake between rounds, and my daughter got very discouraged after a loss and played badly. A bad result can be very discouraging, I know it is for me, but this is not the only reason for their change in attitude. I think the main reason is the way our society puts down intellectual endeavours. Children pick up on this very quickly. It’s not that they don’t want to play chess, it’s that they don’t want their friends to know they play chess. Chess has been branded with the nerd label and apparently being good at chess gives you zero social status.

Being good at sports on the other hand is cool, but I guess this has always been the case. I can remember growing up my two older brothers were both gifted athletes and received the rewards and accolades that come with that, such as popularity and an attractive status to the opposite sex. I loved sports just as much, but being only average athletically; I never received the same rewards. Still it seemed to me that being an average hockey player was better than being a good chess player and if someone asked me what I did for fun I would list the sports I played rather than chess. This attitude is still engrained in me. Recently when I was going to Medicine Hat for a tournament and I was asked at work what I was doing for the weekend, I thought twice before answering. Do I really want these people to know I play chess? They might think I’m a strange, geeky, weird nerd - if they haven’t figured that out already. I reasoned that we are all grown-ups here, and I shouldn’t have these childish fears, so I answered truthfully and said that I was playing in a chess tournament. I could tell by their expressions and their questions that they couldn’t understand why someone would want to do that. If I had said that I was going to a curling bonspiel I know I wouldn’t have got the same reaction.

Maybe the nerd label will one day be removed from chess. I know when I was younger computers were associated with “nerds” but today every kid wants a computer. I think intellectual achievements are just as important as athletic ones but I know that society does not agree with me yet so I will continue to encourage athletic activities for my kids and I will try to convince them to play chess again, but it might be a losing battle.

Meet the new rating, just like the old rating

I see my match against Jamin was rated and my rating has dropped to 1787. This is the exact rating that made me quit chess 15 years ago.

A long time ago, as a scrawny teenager, I wandered into the Charlottetown chess club at the YMCA and joined their monthly tournament. I wasn’t used to playing with a clock but over the course of the month I won a couple of games and threw a couple away and I got my first rating. I think it was around 1300, but I knew I could do better. I joined the club and started playing regularly every Tuesday evening. I improved quickly and started winning most of the club tournaments. My rating seemed to climb naturally but I developed some bad habits. I relied mainly on tactics to win games and I didn’t concentrate on my own game. That worked against the other players in the club but when I left the Island to play my first big tournament I found that I wasn’t as good as I thought. The players in Ontario had much more opening knowledge than me, and I had no tactical advantage. When I got back home I started studying a bit more and concentrating on just a few openings. My rating continued to climb to a peak of just over 1900 but then fell back and settled in the 1800’s and stalled there. I needed more games against higher rated opponents to improve, but there was no internet then and I couldn’t afford to travel to far off tournaments. As other things in life took over my time, I stopped playing regular weekly games and when I did play a tournament my rating started to tumble. I remember my last tournament falling into the Blackbourne Gambit trap to a young kid and and seeing my rating drop below 1787. I decided then that I wasn’t going to play another tournament unless I was prepared and studied my openings.

Years passed, I moved to Alberta, I got married and had children and had not thought about chess much until my kids started playing. After re-entering tournament chess, I have now played ten events and though I think I have improved over the last two years, my rating has now dropped back below 1800 again. Some of my bad habits have changed and some are the same. On the positive side, I do concentrate on my own game now and I don’t have the same desire to wander around the room to try to find a more interesting game. On the negative side, I find I can sometimes have very little enthusiasm when I’m playing a game especially if it is against a lower rated player or if I think I should be doing something else that day. I’m missing a lot when looking at tactics now compared to before. These may be things that go along with getting older, but my weak openings are just a result of my lack of useful studying. The question is now, what to do about my chess?

Option 1. Quit again. I f I do this it will probably not be a conscious decision, but rather a gradual lowering of interest until I find I haven’t played for a long, long, time.
Option 2. Play less regularly probably at a 1700 level. Maybe play in one out of town tournament a year plus the Battle at the Border. The question is, would I get enough enjoyment out of this to continue playing without falling into option 1.
Option 3. Really start studying and see if I can improve to 2000. The problem with this is that there is not enough time in the day to balance work, family, and an obsessive hobby like chess.

I hope I don’t end up choosing option 1, as I still get enjoyment out of playing a good game whether it’s a win or a loss. Plus I haven’t really played a complete tournament yet and I feel there is one inside me waiting to come out. Right now I have no definitive plans to play in an upcoming event. Maybe in the new year.