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RCR chess challenge for show 57

A

AtariMac64

New Member
Joined
Feb 21, 2009
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Hi everyone,

Just listened to the RCR podcast 57 and I was intrigued by the challenge that Carrington and Earl have planned for a challenge between a Commodore 64 that will be used by Earle and an Apple II computer that will be used by Carrington. Earl I think has the upper hand because he did some research and found the best chess playing 64 software of its day while Carrington is going to break the shrink wrap on a ChessMaster 2000 software to use on the Apple II machine that he will be using.

As a fan of chess as well as a fan of the show, I think Carrington should choose another piece of software since ChessMaster 2000 is not considered to be a powerful chess program for its day. It was really used to allow regular people to play against it and not get beat badly all the time.

Regardless I think it is going to be a fun match. I do not think that they have set up the conditions for the match but I would suggest that each side get 30 minutes with no increments so that the machines have time to think.

Looking forward to seeing how this game turns out. Hopefully they might be able to record the moves of the game using chess notation so that others can see what moves were played.
 
AtariMac64 said:
I do not think that they have set up the conditions for the match but I would suggest that each side get 30 minutes with no increments so that the machines have time to think.

Looking forward to seeing how this game turns out. Hopefully they might be able to record the moves of the game using chess notation so that others can see what moves were played.
Click to expand...

That's the plan, on both counts. We're going to limit the time per move, and also Tweet or otherwise publish the moves in standard chess notation so folks can follow along. Also, we'd like to have split-screen video going with both computers showing during the match. :-)

- Earl
 
Both computers are playing each other correct? I'm not sure there should be much concern about the programs. Maybe to a really good chess player the algorithms or game data files it has could make a difference (size of program) but in general I'd probably lose to MicroChess on a Kim which I was tempted to program at a work chess tournament for kicks. While I enjoy it to an extent, I'm no expert but I thought Archon was one of the better known chess programs out there. Googling the name though perhaps that wasn't a standard chess game after all.

Fun time though! The other thing that's been done here and there are getting chatterbots to talk together online. Might lead to some other interesting cross platform projects.

Actually, one other question (guess I should listen to the show and get my answer eh?) is it going to be on real hardware or emulators?
 
barythrin said:
Both computers are playing each other correct?
Click to expand...

Yes, the Apple II will be playing the Commodore 64. Carrington and I will merely be the operators, standing by and hoping they don't mutually decide to take over the world or something.

barythrin said:
Actually, one other question (guess I should listen to the show and get my answer eh?) is it going to be on real hardware or emulators?
Click to expand...

The real thing. We'll hope to set up cameras on the screen for each computer, and stream to the Internet with split-screen.

- Earl
 
It reminds me of the 1980's when this kind of exercise was performed semi-regularly. I've even done it myself a couple of times, both matching different vendors' software and in some cases having two ports of the same program play eachother, e.g. Kingsoft's Grandmaster for the C64 and VIC-20. Of course a number of games on the same difficulty level should be conducted to determine any difference in play strength. I suppose a program that loads a larger library of openings will benefit. Not so sure using RAM to precalculate possible moves will make a difference as conditions may change quickly depending on what the opponent does.

One of my favorite examples was when Chess Challenger (chess computer) played Cyrus (computer chess on ZX Spectrum). In one of the games, Chess Challenger seemingly sacrificed its queen in midgame. Cyrus got blinded by the apparent advantage of taking (?) the queen, and much too late realized it was a trap that let Chess Challenger bring it to a mate within two moves.
 
I look forward to watching this epic match live. Computer vs Computer center stage with the humans in Picture In Picture in the upper right.
The match would take weeks but on the Timex Sinclair 2068 there was a chess program that I use to play. One level 9 it would take 12 hours or more for it to move. Its as close to the feel of playing chess by mail as you can get without the stamps.
 
lol I demo'd (just at my table) a chess game on the IBM, not honestly sure what it's called and a father and son took interest in playing with it for a while. I warned them that I thought it's hidden strategy was taking so long to choose its move that the player would lose interest and turn it off. They played through a few until the 15 minute thinking periods started taking place (I could be exaggerating but they're definitely longer than you feel like sitting there). Still fun stuff. Perhaps the winner can take on another platform at a later date?
 
Earl/Carrington,

I have winner! Seriously, I'd like to challenge the winner of this match to a match against the mighty Atari 8-bit computer. You up for the challenge, or are you scared? :)

Randy Kindig
Floppy Days/ANTIC
 
So.. did I miss it or has it been scheduled for a future date? Was hoping to see the results or watch the tournament if it's recorded :-)
 
I had replied with a link to the RCR Podcast .com site but the forum said it needed moderation so I'm reposting without a URL... They did the challenge and it is pretty entertaining. They linked to a youtube recording from the rcrpodcast .com site...

And for the record, Go C64!!
 
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