Single Comment

On first reading about this game last night, my response was similar to George Duke's. I was incredulously wondering if Larry had never heard of Chessgi and Crazyhouse. It seemed impossible, because these are well-known games, and I remember Larry from the early days of Zillions-of-Games. As it turns out, he has heard of them, and this game is different from them both. Unlike George, I will not give a game a poor rating for being very similar to another well-known game, because a game should be judged on its quality, not its originality. As for the latter, this is the first Chess/Shogi hybrid I've seen with the rule that a player can have no more than eight Pawns on the board at a time. This is arguably an improvement over Chessgi and Crazyhouse. I am considering introducing this rule to my game Shatranji, which is more like Shogi than Chessgi is, because it uses weaker pieces. This rule makes the game more like Shogi, whose restrictions on Pawn drops has the consequence of not letting a player have more than nine Pawns on the board. It can also make it easier for Zillions-of-Games to play the game, because it limits the search tree it has to deal with. (However, this advantage has not been taken advantage of in the ZRF. I easily beat Zillions-of-Games at Mad Queen Shogi, then, using the same settings, I got trounced at a game of Chessgi. My Chessgi and Crazyhouse ZRFs are optimized in a way that pares down the search tree as much as possible, and I would recommend that Larry use them as models for a new Mad Queen Shogi ZRF.)

Anyway, I have a couple suggestions for this page. (1) Separate the discussion of the mechanics of play from the rules. Placing white pieces on checkers is a very good idea that can work just as well for Chessgi and Crazyhouse, but it is unnecessary for computer play, for which piece graphics are available as needed. (2) Mention the game's relation to Chessgi and Crazyhouse and highlight the differences between them. This will aid in understanding of the rules, and it will eliminate responses like George and I had upon reading about this game. Also, if you believe that the differences make this a better game, speak up about that.