Check out Symmetric Chess, our featured variant for March, 2024.


[ Help | Earliest Comments | Latest Comments ]
[ List All Subjects of Discussion | Create New Subject of Discussion ]
[ List Earliest Comments Only For Pages | Games | Rated Pages | Rated Games | Subjects of Discussion ]

Single Comment

Interview with Ralph Betza. An interview with the `Grandmaster of Chess Variant Design'.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]
George Duke wrote on Thu, Dec 10, 2009 10:57 PM UTC:
Humourless observers may miss the point. NextChess as a whole is an exercise. It's advocacy. It's not exact prediction to stand on or stand down. It's not like McCain 49.6, Obama 50.4, +/- 3 confidence interval 96%. Forget all that. We're humanists first--animal rights advocates too, and many other things. Some of our positions even conflict. The game we loved died, or dies before our eyes. Actually all these 21 nominees are still inadequate for the coming computer onslaught though they'll be better than what's left. NextChess5 here is recap and speculation after all the hard work of -1 -2 -3 and -4.
Few designers say they love OrthoChess64 as well as 4500 CVs. Some say they hate OrthoChess and love 1/2 or 35% of the 4500 CVs. What's the difference? Most of us don't play f.i.d.e. orthochess more than 2 or 10 times a year. Most educated people play it less than that. That's a practical matter.
If opposed to NextChess organization, just don't read these threads, as Joe Joyce pointed out. That's common in other histories too besides Chess. Spite trumps even self-interest. If it's not my CV, it's no good. If we make a little progress NextChess-wise, they bolt. The throes of a 1500-year tradition are before us. Don't let history pass you by. 
Now the four next nominees are from Aronson, Fourriere, Gifford, and Gilman, one of each -- a rare foursome at once instead of three. These are hard choices. You have to know each one's body of work? What would you choose of an Aronson, a Fourriere, a Gifford, and a Gilman for one, and only one, Next Chess? Prefer larger than 64 squares, and note that none of the 21 so far are from their work.