chess stories from in the beginning of internet

At the start of the internet there were very few chess sites to play on.there was the icc. Chess.net grandmaster romans site. Chessmaster live. Grandmaster chess owned by seirawan. Gamezone where I played before I tried chess.net I was invited thete one night. What was fun in those days you ccould go play as a guest without joining. Even more fun in speed chess you could give your opponent more time and beat him twice. Lol now. On chessmaster you had to pick a name but could go in an out be anybody you wanted. I had boris beltzem. Smashing pumkins brain surgeons r us mr labotamy. Hammercity. Just to name a few. They stopped letting you give your opponent extra time killed all the never did know why they stopped it.

In those bygone days there was truly one ring to rule them all...

but seriously it sound like you would like lichess.org its free and you dont have to sign up, although it is easier to find rated opponents if you have

a account, plus they have varients wich make things interesting/ and u can pick your own timecontrol +plus what ever increment u like

its a pretty good site

later, goommba88

I've played on most of those places... you left out FICS though. 

But I have a question about the Chessmaster site.  Chessmaster operated a site. I played there around 1996-7.  It disappeared in 1997 and was supposedly replaced by one on which you could only play via a Chessmaster program (I think - that was a long time ago). But for years I've looking for anyone who remembers the very first Chessmaster playing site.  It used a highly configurable interface that consisted of little windows that could be moved anywhere.  The board itself was woodgrained and the fancy set was red and white.  I think they were configurable too.  It took a long time to load, even with a 14.4k modem, but once it loaded it ran flawlessly even on my 486sx computer with 4mg RAM.

Batgirl yes not many people remember it . Sorry to take so long to answer. I am all over playing I always did that. Me I had a little more power. 486 dx100 32 megs of ram. You exactly right about

Chessmaster the original. Then they also had a list on the side you could see who is watching..I finally did break down and get a chessmaster disc for ps2.

I can do many things playing and practice. Go over

Gm games. Play gms listen to lecture s awesome program. In the early days chessmaster was really fun. I played fics as well but it was kind of plain

Compared to other sites I was on. I have played all these. Years because masters and gms as well tend to get mad at me for my rather insincere openings I play and joking during gams. I DO STUFF

Like walk my king out all over the board with black

Move him 12 times then fiaenchettoe my king and queen and still win! I played a game last month

I fiaenchettoed my knights first then my bishops

Then I castled on 25th move another no no. The I ran up and got 2 queens and check mated guy on move 58. My game is very unusual but works for me. I do miss chessmaster and icc where you could

Give more time to someone and really blow their mind! Back then admins didn't have all those rules.

Tim mann also had a board you could use on fics

And a pgn reader in the program. Called winboard.

It was nice to hear from you someone who played

Chess on early chessmaster site. Feel free to say hello anytime! Good chessing to you. As for me I play on multiplayerchess.com it is some kind of sub

To this site. I chose the name queenme because I do get queens a lot they also have an ai there. I think it is kind of weak I get 4 5 queens and butcher it. Have a good day.

Thx goomba I will try it. I aleays like going to new chess sites to read or play.

By the way you forgot on the original site you could

Listen to classical music while you played a game.

Ist batgirl a girl like A_L_I_V_E?

          BITE YOUR TOUNG!  Absolutely not. Batgirl's a middle age woman with class. A long time respected member who's very educated. ALIVE was a nit-wit troll.

Actually you're the first and only person I've even met who does remember it.  I remember when logging on, a tiny blue rectangle would appear in the upper left side of the screen with a counter, counting down from about 5 minutes, letting you know how long until it all loads.  I worked the night shift at that time and would logon after I got home. I'd fix my breakfast (actually my dinner) as I waited for it all to load.

I have used Tim Mann's Winboard since before joining FICS. 
FICS, like ICC, was a telnet site and very complicated (for me) to learn, but once learned, is full of powerful features. When I first installed winboard and tried to join FICS, I didn't, of course, know any of the FICS commands.  I didn't even know it had commands. Trying to sign up there took me two weeks because once the site came up, it would start scrolling due to the amount of shouts, seeks, etc. and I couldn't read the instructions or even follow what was happening. To be honest, it totally freaked me out as I was also new to the internet and computers in general.  But after learning and getting comfortable, I played at various FICS sites around the world -I remember the German, Dutch, Danish sites. In fact the operator of the Danish site use the handle, theDane. The European sites, however, had only a fraction of the members as the US site.At that time I could also play a ICC (formerly ICS) as a guest. I think they stopped that.

I still use winboard all the time as my pgn viewer.

Oh lord, I hate that phrase unless I'm studying Medieval Chess.

       Sorry my bad     I was trying to defend her honor, your honor.

Batgirl yes I played a lot on icc as a guest. And I played a short time on all those fics sites I met some players there that played on icc. So I bounced back and forth icc, chessmaster live, gm romans site I played. Many 22 23 hour marathons in speed chess. I actually quit playing for about ten years.

I just came back joined in here in july an started playing again. Yes I like winboard a lot to go over my old games sometimes. Icc still has a thirty day free trial but no free guest play. I like the free play an too play incognito. I do this so I dont have to deal

With all the cursing people do sometimes when I toy

With them on the board with my strange openings.

I played these long before the internet in real tournament play. I dont intend to change now. You know you sound like a real dedicated chess player

Who loves the game. My hat off to you. I have not many female players but I really like the polgars!

Such talent!. If you see any of my crazy games

Thibk nothing of it I just like to have fun because

Book openings are all so mundane, can be so boring. Me I love to get on the board and fish in troubled waters!. You have a good day nice to speak

To you again.

Batgirl forgot to tell you thats why I came to the internet. You could play people all over the world.

I played people in dozens of country s. It was great and still is!

WTF all of those chess sites you listed and you forget about

Yahoo Chess?

Summon the minions and trolls to take you away. Forgetting about Yahoo Chess? what a sacrilege this is to the chess world.

You shall be lashed by the minions and trolled by the trolls for such a violation.

Yahoo Chess one chess website to rule all other chess website.

It shut down sadly.

Yahoo Chess was a joke.  It had a great interface and was a good place to meet a friend for a private game, but as a chess server it isn't even worth mentioning.

Are you kidding the board pieces were the best board pieces ever! With a nice Wooden set

By "Roman's site" do you mean ICS?  Kasparov opened a short-lived site, I think it was called KasparovChess or something like that.  Chessnet was a good place until they started making restrictions.  I was banned from ICC  because I accessed the internet via AOL and nothing I did would change their collective minds, so I wrote off ICC and went back to FICS where everyone was still complaining about ICC charging members to play.  If you played on the Danish FICS site, I guess you knew theDane. I once helped him test computer engines they were adding to the site.

Ummm, I said, "It had a great interface." 

As a place to play with strangers, it was pernicious, to say the least.

Ah, Winboard.  This used to be my favorite interface, 16 years or so ago.  I liked it so much I put together a tribute page to it, with helpful tips and screenshots.  Tim Mann, the orginal author of WinBoard, liked it so much, he linked to it from his page. 

Alas, my Winboard page is now so old, little of it is still helpful or relevant, I imagine.  I leave it up for nostalgia purposes only.

I used to be an Administrator on both FICS and US Chess Live.  For a couple of years the USCF paid for my yearly USCF membership, in return for my services as an Administrator.