Enter Your Reply The Comment You're Replying To 🕸Fergus Duniho wrote on Sat, Dec 27, 2008 01:20 AM UTC:I would like to introduce the term abstract hunting game to describe Chess and most Chess variants. A hunting game is a game whose object is in some way the capture, incapacitation, or death of something or someone. Hunting games are common in sports. Besides bullfighting, which is game hunting before an audience, American football, rugby, soccer, hockey, lacrosse, and basketball are hunting games that substitute a ball, puck or other object for live prey. Since you can't kill a ball or puck, the goal line or basket is used to signify a successful capture of the prey. Of these, football and rugby are perhaps most like hunting, for in these games, a player may carry the ball, and other players may chase and tackle him. Baseball is also a hunting game of sorts. Players hunt after the ball, and they try to use the ball to catch players running around the bases. Features of hunting are common in other popular sports too. Without the use of firearms, hunters need to outrun their prey. Races focus on this aspect of hunting. Many video games focus on the shooting aspect of hunting. Getting back to Chess, the object is to checkmate one particular piece, the King. Each player controls a group of pieces that work together as a team, or pack, to hunt down their prey. In the course of the game, other pieces may be treated as prey, but the King remains the chief prey whose incapacitation really matters. Chess differs from games like football by being an entirely abstract game that requires only thought (or algorithmic analysis) and does not depend upon any physical skill or prowess. So, to distinguish it from hunting sports like football, I call Chess an abstract hunting game. This concept is close to Christian Freeling's category of checkmate games. The difference is that it includes games whose object is the capture or stalemate of a particular piece. Thus, it would include Smess, whose object is the capture of the Brain, but which is not technically a checkmate game. The category of abstract hunting games seems more natural than the category of checkmate games, because the main difference between checkmate games and games whose goal is the capture of a single piece is in what the concluding move of the game is. These games are otherwise played in the same manner. Chess has commonly been described as a war game. In some respects, this is accurate. Both sides control armies of pieces that capture one another. But I think that abstract war games is a broader category than abstract hunting games. For one thing, Checkers is a war game whose goal is the elimination of the enemy rather than the incapacitation of one piece. It isn't always the object of a war to capture the enemy leader. The American Revolutionary War was fought to secure freedom from Great Britain, not to capture King George. Nor was it the goal of the British to simply capture George Washington. They were seeking to suppress an uprising, and if George Washington had been captured, other leaders would have stepped up to take his place. We could say that Chess is a type of abstract war game. If we want a concept that narrows in on what type of game Chess and most of its variants are, I think there may not be a more fitting concept than abstract hunting game. Edit Form You may not post a new comment, because ItemID Hunting Games does not match any item.