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Game Reviews by CBagleyJones
that program is great that at http://www.chaturanga.com/ .. default variant is 'double mate' where red/yellow play against black/green, winning by checkmating both enemy kings, or reducing them to lone king. red can say mate black, but that doesn't mean it is permanent, just that black does not move every time it is blacks move .. green can release black by attacking etc, or it may be in red/yellow's interest to actually release black, it is pretty amazing!! another great variant is 'rajah capture, which can be played with teams or everyone against everyone. kings can be taken in this variant, there is no mates. all these games are brilliant, always lots of action.
you have to love the name .. 'gridlock' lol, what a classic :)
yes this game can't have a 'poor' rating, it's fantastic :)) it would be even better with the cannon prob fixed, but even still, that can't make it anything less than .. fantastic :)
Crazyhouse is not a recognized variant of the month? i don't know how that could be, it shouldn't even have to be voted on, not a hour goes by on the planet where a crazyhouse game is not being played, and that is a conservative estimate. you should make crazyhouse a recognized variant along with whatever other game you recognize in a future month
ok well i've played this game a few times now, and yes, it is a brilliant game. congrats :)
actually the case of kings on a1 and c2 pawn on a2 is a success for showdown chess because it makes a win for black instead of a draw, which would happen in normal chess after white plays Kc1 (this is a replacement for normal chess not shatranj). Black must of played the brilliant (he he) ... a3-a2!! thus winning the game. You are just looking at the 'normal' rules if you are disappointed at 'having' to move your king away, you should not of got yourself in that position. Of course, i don't like these attempts to make chess with less draws, i am in favor of giving (as far as tournaments go) either no points for draws, same as losing, or 2 points for wins, half for draws, but best would be to come up with a different chess altogether ha ha, but not those variants with rook/knight and bishop/knight combo's. Terrible pieces :) we should go back to good old 4 handed chaturanga :) anyway, showdown chess is at least an attempt to somehow address the major promblem of the terrible state of draws in modern chess, i don't think it deserves a 'poor' rating so i will throw in a 'good'.
ahhhhhhhhhaaaa lol!! so, SRC is funny and on the level wow, didn't see that coming :) only one thing to do now, give it an 'excellent' :) god bless SRC, and please forgive all those doubters he he (*whistles*) (oh btw, pretty cool idea about the rules being mysterious)
this game plays really well, the elephants moving as alfil and non-capturing dabbaba is great, love it, opening set up interesting too, especially with the elephants on same color square!
wow this looks great, obviously a lot of work has gone into making NovaChess. Graphics are cool, and so many fairy pieces, it is like a world of fairy chess! Lots of interesting and fun pieces too, and great with 2 kings! :)
well this is a better than you used to have it. i think you should look at the way 4 player chaturanga is played, and use that idea for this game. There is a 'doublemate' variant, (also a king capture team based variant too) where the goal is to mate the kings. when a king is mated, everything remains, but the mated player misses their turn (while in mate, their pieces can be taken), but only if 'held' in mate .. the mated persons team-mate can try to release them from mate, and if they do, the 'unmated' player starts to move again .. pretty exciting. there is also a variant, with everyone against everyone, played with king capture (no mate) which is pretty wild, to say the least .. he he .. you could of course play your game like that too.
american chess, how can i praise this game enough. stunning, highly original,beautiful game. love the soldier, colonel, artillery, missile, 3 kings, the rule about having to have a king in the 'zone', and pieces promoting to kings on final rank. also the 50 move rule is soooo cool. the missile ... ooooh baby, lol, what a piece, awesomely powerful, yet it is totally playable because it can't hit the final rank. as someone said, you can feel the power of this piece throughout the game. best game i've seen all year i would say. well done andy, and supreme thanks to larry for making this a zillions game.
looks brilliant!! where is the zrf!!! lol :)
looks pretty good, you didn't say what rank pawns promote did you? .. 8th rank sounds cool to me :)
once again, chess reflects life :)
wow, your really 'out there' blackie, trippy game, well done. (probably the 2 ratings you got were a bit premature, so lets *bump* it)
wow this game is stunning. it's hard to find words to describe properley, but, it really is unbelievable, a work of art. apart from the 'displacer', all the pieces move fairly simply. But the gameplay is far from simple, it is extremely complex, rich in depth. Beautiful game. Roberto and i are playing 2 games on game courier for anyone interested in checking it out. It would a major disappointment if this game does not make it's way to zillions.
hey this looks good, i like the idea of these pieces dropping pieces the further up the board they go, should make for interesting chess, well done. (zrf?)
ok i have my rating cap on :) well this game is a legend in chess variant world, so i'll start here, great fun with different armies :)
this game is a classic
oh this should be rated better than good!
hey here is another 'good' rating for an 'excellent' game :)
ahhhh shogi, love the drops
oops this game needs a ratings boost, where are you shatranj lovers!
i have only just recently played this game, the 'templar' is a great piece, it plays well with the normal chess set-up (adding dabbaba move) the board is great too with the added space at the back. cool game.
ahhhhhaaa well i trust your opinion you know :) .. have to decline game offer, not starting any new games at the moment, i was just interested to know how the 'spider' play-tested, if it slowed down the game, but looking more at the rules, and it finally sinking in, i like how the spider/crab/etc don't move on fide board, and how they go from fide board to x board. i see that dimension x is going well in score count for up-coming tourney, so i think we shall see this game play-tested well, i look forward to seeing the games. anyway, looks terrific to me, well done.
i will just finish up my rating spree that i started the other day with these last couple of games
brilliant collection of games
great 'shatranj like' pieces .. concerning rook or dabbaba, both variants would be ok, but i do feel the dabbaba is a cool piece, fits in well with the others, and should not be too weak combined with the other 'strong' pieces.
looks terrific, interesting pieces, i like the way you have the 'grand chess' set up, and great to see 10 pieces only in total on a 10x10 board. some people go crazy with the amount of pieces they use :)) lol
you got enough variants going here Joe? he he, well another great looking 'shatranj' type game, terrific idea with 'jumpingking'! + direction changing pieces very interesting!
yes this is a great game, David and i had a game on game courier, it is nice playing with the general (dragonhorse) and cannon, combined with rook knight and elephant/fers (which i like to call 'ferfil'). Opening pawn set up is very interesting too. All these things makes for open and exciting play. Cool game. (David, i was trying to email you, but there is a prob)
Well i think this looks great, it has my fav pieces. With promotion zone last 3 ranks and game played with drops, play should be fast paced. It has a nice shatranj feel to it. Even though i most likely prefer promoted pieces reverting back to pawns, i think it is interesting and fun the way it plays in this game. For sure, when promoting, you would have to consider things differently. Gary, i was going to say, defence will be important, because pro zone is 3 ranks, pawn drops will be deadly, and wazir and fers could often be hard pressed to defend, and just before i looked at your game going at the moment on game courier :)
hmm this place is a bit frisky lately, anyway, i'm going to rate some unusual games, and what better place to start than here. This is an amazing game, no need to say anymore. Highly original, strikingly beautiful concept.
time travel in chess, how good is this! I looked at the game you mentioned worth checking out - MSchmahl-cvgameroom-2004-77-566 Fri, Aug 27, 2004, very very good, classic. Fascinating game, well done Gary.
very intersting idea, too bad no zrf. i have not seen anything like this concept, is there anything else with this theme? Anyway, very, very, good.
this game is pretty 'out there' too, extremely interesting. Looked a bit at the game courier games, seems to play very good, congrats.
this game too is fascinating, this game started your other variants on this theme right? (assimilation chess etc) Very complex, at least for me anyway ... all variants on this theme you have done seem to be all good too, well done.
this game is so bent i can't understand it at all, but it reads extremely interesting, to say the least .. check out here, direct link to game explanation - http://www.geocities.com/chessdp/ttchsrules.htm now how bizzare is this explanation of the game! How can i rate a game i can't understand, pfft, it is so easy :))
well this is a very interesting game, 16x12 wooah, big, and looks great. Command and control, Joe you big kid!! Love the idea of the 'chiefs' moving their armies, very cool, love it.
don't know, probably someone who wants to know how to play chess, or look up something they are not sure of ...
hey, u would have to walk on the board to make move would u? (lol) love how big it is, probably would be hell to play :) what is the difference between 'step' and 'slide', is 'step' different from 'leap', i dont kinda understand.
Heya Fergus, after our talk last week about pawns i thought i'd check out your game here. And i must say, it's been a lot of fun!! Now, if u don't know, i am a big fan of the more 'chaturanga, shatranj' etc etc styled pieces, and have only played games with these kind of pieces for years now. So, this game, looked very daunting to me, to say the least, as i pondered my first move, hehe. After the first couple of games, i was all over the place, the game seemed hard the manage, very dynamic and nearly chaotic. But then, after a few more games, i started to get a feel for it, and i had some wonderful games. I'm rating 'excellent'. Nearly right from the start, the game seems dynamic to me, and it stays that way throughtout the game, but there seems to be a steadiness of play, the 'chaotic' i felt at first, was 'controlled', still there, but it's balanced and 'held' in the game. The Cavlier's i think put a uniqueness to the game. They do act as 'pawn's' but they are more flexible than a pawn, and when they get to the 8th rank they are in striking distance of promoting. Nice piece placement for the opening, and great seeing the 'nightrider' playing too. Sometimes, in a somewhat wild position, it was interesting playing a cavlier non-threateningly up the board and feeling it was safe and the best move. I really feel the cavlier makes this game unique and exciting. Great work.
Hey this game looks great, love the big board and not too many pieces added, really like the 'duke' too. I will have to check out the game courier logs, i like this type of game because one can learn more about gameplay with fairly short range type pieces on a very large board. Great stuff.
Great game Mats, congrats. The pyrrhus, what a piece, i found it really painful at first, lol, i thought it's power of paralyzing pieces was too much, the knight being the only piece that could attack the pyrrhus! I wondered if the pyrrhus's range should be 'cut down', like say paralyzing 4 or 5 squares range on the queen lines. However, once i got used to the piece, it seems to me the game is very smooth and heaps of fun and very nice. I think the way the pyrrhus is is the best. The knight in this game is actually a pretty powerful piece, much more powerful than the bishops and probably more powerful than the rooks too, because it can attack the pyrrhus. If both pyrrhus's are paralyzed, you wouldn't want to have two bishops against two knights, lol, that's for sure. I'm rating excellent. Oh i notice you have a 10x10 game with two pyrrhus's a side, how does that play compared to the 8x8 do you think, i'll have to check it out.
Yeah i like the pieces too. I'll be releasing something to showcase over 200 fairy pieces (not a game), i'll add these 2 pieces. I don't mind the 10x10 board, and as far as it making most pieces too slow, i think that really is a matter for personal taste. I do think though the piece density might be a bit heavy.
Do the knave and debtor move the same as in Charles Gilman's game 'Knavish Chess'. I first thought these pieces moved fully as a knight with one piece having the horizontal dabbaba leap and the other the vertical dabbaba leap. oh don't worry, i see that they do, these pieces are better than i thought!
This looks a great game, love the dragon piece, also i think the extra side squares are useful, i'm sure they will be used. Site loads fine to me.
You can speculate all you want, but in the end, it is all speculation. What governs what is considered the 'oldest' chess is what records are the oldest found, that is it. I dont think this is correct of course, so much records of the ancients has been lost. I consider it unclear where chess began, no one can say for sure. An earthquake could happen in China revealing an ancient tomb and chess writing 2,000 years ago are discovered, then chess would be said to have come from china. The idea that chess always evolves to something better also is debateable. People love inventing things and trying new things, it does not mean the newer idea is a progression. There is no reason to consider that the modern pawn, moving 1 square forward and capturing diagonally could not have been the first pawn to exist. One thing i can't help thinking, the date we give as chess beginning, seems to me to be highly unlikely, i feel chess is much older, in India, China and Japan. The ancients were NOT stupid. They were highly advanced. To think that all they played was a 'race game' .... well, really? Look at the mahabharata verse, where Yudhisthira talks about 'delighting the king with his play' ... he is going to delight the king with his play in a race game? Come on ... Chess most likely has been around in India and China and Japan for thousands and thousands of years. But of course, this is speculation. It's interesting what you saying though, don't get me wrong.
thanks, i like the new pieces, well done.
never noticed this game before, 4 very nice pieces, congrats.
Nice big board shogi like games, wonderful array of pieces. Goldpashtun and Silverpashtun great pieces. Lots more, have not looked at fully but i will, just thought i would post first off anyway. Congrats.
The 'Bishop' in this game moves as a 'Ferfil', and the 'Councillor' moves like a 'Centaur' (knight, wazir, fers). Would this be the first appearance for these pieces? Anyone know an earlier game they are in, or another old game anyway. I know 'Ferfil' is in the game 'Shako', 1990, by Jean-Louis Cazaux.
The 'Queen' in this game moves like an 'Alibaba'. It does say there is a special rule about queen capturing another queen and to look in 'rules' section, but i can't seem to see anything. Edit: oh capture might be 'concourse of queens' rule. Anyway, would this be the first appearance of an 'Alibaba' in a game? Anyone know of an earlier game with the 'Alibaba', or, any old game it plays in?
Hi all, I dont think there can be much advantage having first move, not with so many armies on such a big board. Yes 'Qin' have the dream start, most space around them, 'Chu' and 'Yan' have next best start. I dont think this gives an advantage though really, because of the nature of multi player games, anyone that is looking stronger than the others will naturally become a target for everyone else, hehe. Interesting pieces 'crossbowman' and 'archer' and 'cavalry'. I dont know if i have seen such pieces before. Also the start position is interesting for 'Qin' in relation to 'Yan' but mostly because of 'Chu' with 'crossbowman'. Oh, do you have link to wiki site, i cant seem to find it. http://chessvariants.wikidot.com/
Very interesting game, i have never noticed this before. It appears to me the pawn is checking the King, and also attacking the pawn on a2. It would be good to know what the author says about the Knight. Hans says 'The rules do not state exactly the way knights move. One could assume a knight moves one square orthogonally, and then one square diagonally, skipping again attacked squares.' This is one way to describe the Knight move, but some people describe it as moving 2 squares orthogonally then 1 to the side, or even moving 1 diagonally and 1 orthogonally outward. If you assume it moves like Hans says, then it does appear it is checking the King.
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