Check out Modern Chess, our featured variant for January, 2025.

Enter Your Reply

The Comment You're Replying To
M Winther wrote on Sun, Oct 19, 2008 05:02 AM UTC:
>>I don't have Zillions, and I do not have the slightest interest 
>> in buying it, as it plays like cr*p.

Whoever said that isn't aware that there are tweaked Zillions chess
variants programs that play a fine game of chess. The problem is, namely,
that Zillions tends to move about with knights too much in the opening,
and develops the queen too early. It also sometimes misjudges the value of
the pieces. It moves the king to the corner too readily. But all this can
be easily corrected by tweaking. I always do this in my implementations:
http://tinyurl/chessvariants

One example is my implementation of Chinese Chess. It plays much better
than the standard implementation while the latter greatly overestimates
the value of the cannon compared with the rook, and underestimates the
Elephants and the Mandarins. It values them according to mobility, so they
get a too low value. But in Chinese Chess their blocking capability, king
protective capability, and their functionality as screen for the cannon,
give them a higher value. So one must tweak them to give them a higher
value, otherwise Zillions can't simply play correctly. That's why I
asked Larry to tweak the pieces in his Xiang Hex.
/Mats

Edit Form

You may not post a new comment, because ItemID Zillions and GC does not match any item.