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Chess 2 ( http://ludemegames.com/chess2/ http://ludemegames.com/chess2/). I'm not joking. USGamer has a good write-up on it: http://www.usgamer.net/articles/che

by scott_s 13y ago

Chess 2 ( http://ludemegames.com/chess2/ http://ludemegames.com/chess2/). I'm not joking. USGamer has a good write-up on it: http://www.usgamer.net/articles/chess-2-the-sequel http://www.usgamer.net/articles/chess-2-the-sequel I agree there's a certain amount of hubris behind the endeavor. But I'm interested in the design of balanced games, and the ways in which some old games are not balanced or rigid.

KVFinn 13y ago
>Chess 2 ( http://ludemegames.com/chess2/ http://ludemegames.com/chess2/). I'm not joking. USGamer has a good write-up on it: http://www.usgamer.net/articles/chess-2-the-sequel http://www.usgamer.net/articles/chess-2-the-sequel >I agree there's a certain amount of hubris behind the endeavor. But I'm interested in the design of balanced games, and the ways in which some old games are not balanced or rigid. The creator's blog post is quite entertaining, thought it was a joke but the game is quite real and looks interesting: >Chess 1 was a big hit, no question there, but a few issues have cropped up over the years. First, the original game ends in a draw uncomfortably often. Second, memorization (rather than on-the-spot intuition) ended up being much more important than the original developers intended. Even top players such as Fischer and Capablanca complained about this. Third, because it has no hidden information, the ability to capitalize on reading your opponent is more limited than it could be. And finally, the first version offered only a single army and one matchup. http://www.sirlin.net/blog/2013/5/30/announcing-chess-2.html http://www.sirlin.net/blog/2013/5/30/announcing-chess-2.html >So Anand encountered a "mild surprise" in the opening moves that left him "flying blind" (meaning the board was in a position with which he had not previously studied) and because of that he decided to not keep pursuing the game. He just engineered a draw. >ntuitive understanding of the game and moments of brilliant improvisation are the most exciting aspects, and yet memorized lines of play are so deeply entrenched now that when a top player encounters anything outside of memorized, studied lines he heads directly for the draw. It's really the opposite of what you'd hope. http://www.sirlin.net/blog/2013/11/11/high-level-chess.html http://www.sirlin.net/blog/2013/11/11/high-level-chess.html
- lunaru 13y ago
  Since you bring up Sirlin, I would recommend Yomi, which is a card game that is very balanced and very competitive. I don't think it's as deep as chess, but I certainly enjoy playing it.
- mayanksinghal 13y ago
  > the ability to capitalize on reading your opponent is more limited than it could be Shouldn't be a capitalizable entity in chess. I like chess (unfortunately I don't like it enough to practice it often) because of it's no make-a-poker-face-now requirement.
smky80 13y ago
That actually looks pretty promising, but seems like it will have major balance issues. To me the trick is preserve some kind of backward compatibility with chess while finding a way to increase the strategic content. Ironically stuff like increasing the board size like in 3D chess variants, can actually reduce the strategic content by reducing the role of long-term factors like pawn structure. EDIT: I can see some combination of the game's features -- particularly the king "touchdown" -- sort of working against the strategic content. IE people just playing gimmick openings to sneak their king across.
- NoahTheDuke 13y ago
  Those kinds of "gimmick" openings don't work well once people know the game. It's like losing to the 4-turn checkmate: it only happens once or twice before you start looking for it and planning against it.
  - smky80 13y ago
    Yeah but this game has like 10 times as many openings so it will take much longer to learn them. The reason why memorization is a problem in chess isn't because there aren't enough openings/endgames to remember, it's because most players need to memorize certain patterns to reach a certain level of effectiveness, because they would rarely be able to solve those problems over the board. So the solution to the chess memorization problem isn't necessarily more openings and more complexity, which ironically could just INCREASE opening importance. Rather I think the idea is to increase the importance and depth of long term strategic factors like pawns, the sort of understanding of which grows over time and doesn't lend itself to rote memorization.

by scott_s 13y ago

KVFinn 13y ago

>Chess 2 ( http://ludemegames.com/chess2/ http://ludemegames.com/chess2/). I'm not joking. USGamer has a good write-up on it: http://www.usgamer.net/articles/chess-2-the-sequel http://www.usgamer.net/articles/chess-2-the-sequel >I agree there's a certain amount of hubris behind the endeavor. But I'm interested in the design of balanced games, and the ways in which some old games are not balanced or rigid. The creator's blog post is quite entertaining, thought it was a joke but the game is quite real and looks interesting: >Chess 1 was a big hit, no question there, but a few issues have cropped up over the years. First, the original game ends in a draw uncomfortably often. Second, memorization (rather than on-the-spot intuition) ended up being much more important than the original developers intended. Even top players such as Fischer and Capablanca complained about this. Third, because it has no hidden information, the ability to capitalize on reading your opponent is more limited than it could be. And finally, the first version offered only a single army and one matchup. http://www.sirlin.net/blog/2013/5/30/announcing-chess-2.html http://www.sirlin.net/blog/2013/5/30/announcing-chess-2.html >So Anand encountered a "mild surprise" in the opening moves that left him "flying blind" (meaning the board was in a position with which he had not previously studied) and because of that he decided to not keep pursuing the game. He just engineered a draw. >ntuitive understanding of the game and moments of brilliant improvisation are the most exciting aspects, and yet memorized lines of play are so deeply entrenched now that when a top player encounters anything outside of memorized, studied lines he heads directly for the draw. It's really the opposite of what you'd hope. http://www.sirlin.net/blog/2013/11/11/high-level-chess.html http://www.sirlin.net/blog/2013/11/11/high-level-chess.html

lunaru 13y ago
Since you bring up Sirlin, I would recommend Yomi, which is a card game that is very balanced and very competitive. I don't think it's as deep as chess, but I certainly enjoy playing it.
mayanksinghal 13y ago
> the ability to capitalize on reading your opponent is more limited than it could be Shouldn't be a capitalizable entity in chess. I like chess (unfortunately I don't like it enough to practice it often) because of it's no make-a-poker-face-now requirement.

smky80 13y ago

That actually looks pretty promising, but seems like it will have major balance issues. To me the trick is preserve some kind of backward compatibility with chess while finding a way to increase the strategic content. Ironically stuff like increasing the board size like in 3D chess variants, can actually reduce the strategic content by reducing the role of long-term factors like pawn structure. EDIT: I can see some combination of the game's features -- particularly the king "touchdown" -- sort of working against the strategic content. IE people just playing gimmick openings to sneak their king across.

NoahTheDuke 13y ago
Those kinds of "gimmick" openings don't work well once people know the game. It's like losing to the 4-turn checkmate: it only happens once or twice before you start looking for it and planning against it.
- smky80 13y ago
  Yeah but this game has like 10 times as many openings so it will take much longer to learn them. The reason why memorization is a problem in chess isn't because there aren't enough openings/endgames to remember, it's because most players need to memorize certain patterns to reach a certain level of effectiveness, because they would rarely be able to solve those problems over the board. So the solution to the chess memorization problem isn't necessarily more openings and more complexity, which ironically could just INCREASE opening importance. Rather I think the idea is to increase the importance and depth of long term strategic factors like pawns, the sort of understanding of which grows over time and doesn't lend itself to rote memorization.