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Chessville
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Finally Somebody Gets it Right With all the advances in computer graphics over the last few years (streaming video, Direct X, Java, etc.) and because chess plays so well on computers, I would have thought that by now there would be a ton of good chess software out. Sadly, this is not the case. After years of putting out basically opening books on CDs, ChessBase has only within the past year or two begin to take advantage of streaming video and put out several teaching videos, such as those by IM’s Andrew Martin and Jacob Aagaard. However, while these are a vast improvement over the previous fair, I still can’t help but feel that we haven’t really tapped the full capabilities of how computers can help chess players improve their game. My feeling is that they need to be more interactive. For example, let’s say that after Martin goes over the main lines of my beloved Trompowsky, then I would like him to bring up test positions and ask me to find the best move. After I make the move, he comes on the screen and tells me if I was right or not, and if I wasn’t, WHY my chosen move was not best. Now admittedly, this would take quite a bit of work to put together, as Martin would have to tape a video response for every main reply (for ridiculous moves, you could just have one standard video clip where he says something like, “Very funny!” and rolls his eyes). Anyway, I just think this would be a much more effective, not to mention enjoyable and fun way to learn the openings, then just sitting passively watching video. Okay, back to the DVD at hand. SPEED CHESS by Generation Chess is not designed to be instructional (although it is to some extent), but mostly entertaining—and it succeeds at this quite well.
In match one, fearless attacker GM Larry Christiansen takes on strategic virtuoso GM Joel Benjamin. In match two, young prodigy GM Hikaru Nakamura (the current US Champion) takes on the always dangerous GM Alexander Shabalov. I don’t want to give away who wins in this review, but I will tell you that the very first game between Benjamin and Christiansen features a blistering attack that is simply an awesome sight to behold. And just when it looks like the defending side has things covered, blamo!, the attacker comes back with yet another shot. Although I hate cliché’s, this one game alone really is worth the price of the entire DVD. In each match two games are played, with each player getting White and Black once. If the match ends in a 1-1 tie, then they go to a sudden death shootout, where White has more time but Black gets draw odds. The second match features Nakamura against Shabalov, and surprisingly one of them commits a horrific blunder and hangs a rook! Suffice it to say that the match ends in a tie and they go to what Ashley calls the “Armageddon tiebreak” where one of them prevails. The two winners will appear together in the finals, which will (I assume) appear on a future DVD.
The Bottom Line All I can tell you
is that I thoroughly enjoyed watching this DVD (and I even invited a few of
my chess buddies to come over and watch it as well). It is
professionally done and is one of the few chess DVDs that is definitely
worth the money. Not only is it highly entertaining, but you may even
learn a few things as well. As this was only the qualifying stage, I
can’t wait to see the next DVD which will contain the finals and no doubt a
lot more fireworks.
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Credit
for this has to go GM Maurice Ashley. I first became a fan of his when
he and GM Daniel King would host the exciting PCA Intel Grand Prix Chess
Championships in 1994 and 1995 for Grandmaster Video. The two were the
Al Michaels and John Madden of chess commentators—they made the games both
exciting and dramatic. Who can forget how Ashley used sports
commentary such as: “That knight’s posted up like David Robinson!” or “That
pawn is about to score a touchdown!” It was great stuff, and although
some thought Ashley’s style was a bit over the top, I enjoyed it.
A
few years ago, Maurice was a co-commentator on ESPN with GM Yasser Seirawan
for the Kasparov vs. computer matches. And this year, he not only put
on the richest chess tournament in the history of the game with
I
should mention that the technical features of the DVD are quite good.
The picture is clear and you can follow all the action quite easily
(although I would have liked to see the clock times super-imposed on the
screen, rather than cutaways to the DGT clock every now and then). At
the beginning of the game, the camera starts out on the players and then
cuts away to a two dimensional DGT electronic brown and white chess board
(think Fritz) so you can easily follow the action. And, of course, all
the while GM Ashley is commentating in his inimitable and enthusiastic
style. At the end of each match he does a brief interview with both
the winner and the loser.
