Hippopotamus Defence

Spassky's Hippos have been reviewed by so many...

I started Simon Williams' course and ended up requesting a refund. (and got it) He seems driven more by ego than by logic and soundness.

ChessGiant wants $90 for his course while De Santis' book is less than $30.

Funny how books contain a lot more information and are more easily referenced, but videos cost more.

If I want to fix a 1956 Chevy then I'm not going to buy a book on a 1956 Ford.

Put like that I suppose it is strange. A book takes ages to write, yet a video course can be rattled out in a matter of hours if you have sufficient knowledge. I love books and i'm glad they don't charge $100. Sadly, to date, the De Santis book is the only properly structured opening book on the Hippo. I see all the other books as game collections, although they sometimes hint towards certain themes.

The move order I use was inspired from watching Eric Hansen's Hippo Speedrun. 
I watched all 17 episodes and have played through and studied all 233 games. Not very many of those games are good examples of how to play Hippo. Sometimes his Hippos are downright sloppy. He mostly starts with the double fianchetto and frequently runs into trouble from early advances of center pawns. The fact that he eventually wins those games is not due to any characteristic of the Hippo, but rather because he is a brilliant young Grandmaster playing against inferior opponents.
I believe the move order I play provides the Hippo player with the best opportunity to reach the full Hippo. And I believe the full Hippo provides the full potential of the Hippo. That's when the game begins.
I like the Hippos of Tiger Hillarp Persson that he has played since he published his books. A couple of them are in the De Santis book. He plays the full Hippo and he plays it patiently, passively and defensively, sometimes making repeat and waiting moves and stalling to force the opponent into difficult decisions when he might make a weak move or blunder. I believe this is the best way to play Hippo. Even if it is not, I believe it is a style of playing chess that all players would benefit from exploring.
Hippo is the antithesis of attack - attack - attack.
It is prepare - prepare - prepare to attack - attack - attack.

Hansen is like Houdini in some of those games. I might watch it again taking extra note of the tactics he uses to get out of trouble. This is my favorite Tiger Persson game. Slow castling and forming a Queen/Bishop battery in the same game!

Anyone reading this thread thinking "Damn, the Hippo is far too expensive to learn" can check out these 300 FREE videos! 😂

The Chess Giant - Solomon Ruddell {Won National Master title playing the Hippo with both colours}

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKx6s-gbAEVFRPrHu40cMsTa2IiCGwUba

Robert Drury (Most updated Hippo channel and every game talked through and explained)

https://www.youtube.com/@kniteplayer-chess

Eric Hansen's Hippo Speedrun (He goes from 800 to 2500 using nothing but the Hippo with white and black)

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLUjxDD7HNNTjPPDAZGCcpmpSmw6QFLxJU

I like ChessGiant and I have followed him for a long time, but I was disappointed when he started promoting this idea of not playing ...a6 when White has a pawn on c4. I think the idea is ridiculous even after listening to his reasoning. And this guy wants $90 from me. I follow his logic but ...a6 is not played in relation to c4. It is played as part of the Hippo and Black is not weakened from playing ...a6. It is a strong move in the Modern Defense and in Hippo. What if you played ...a6 on move 4 and White plays c4 on move 5. Are you then in trouble? I don't think so.

When c4 is on the board the problem with a6 is that if your opponent advances his a pawn down to a5 then you countering b5 is not a viable push therefore you may have to play a5 to prevent your opponent from playing a5. So basically you can save a tempo by holding off of the a6 move, now if there is some odd reason that he can’t or doesn’t have time for a4 then a5 then by all means play a6. It’s situational.

I know he plays a lot of Bullet chess with the Hippo, I can imagine in those super fast games if he can't get the b5 pawn thrust in he doesn't feel the need for a6 to support it. But I nearly always play a6. Knights and bishops end up on b5 far too often when I don't. Speaking of bullet chess I struggle with 10 minute chess! 😂 I'm doing 15/10 from now on because sometimes the Hippo simply can't be rushed, and neither can my ageing brain.

I went to Solomon's page to see what his latest Hippo games look like, and yesterday he won a 1 minute bullet game using the same Queen/Bishop battery from that Tiger Persson game. It looks like it could be a devastating tactic in certain open positions.

I use that tactic sometimes, too. It is also known as the "Super Fianchetto" or "Reti's Arrow". It is usually more of a threat than an execution, but the opponent cannot ignore it, and that can lead to advantages. Bent Larsen used it quite often.

I've noted it as the "Hippo Harpoon".

My biggest worry would be getting the rook trapped, but it certainly looks threatening. In positions where white is fairly passive and you have time to manoeuvre a bit, it's a nice option to keep in mind. I like the way the bishop seemed to clear a path for the Queen to enter the centre of the board in Solomon's game.

you have a clinical obsession with playing the exact same thing in all situations even when its clear they are better alternatives. chess doesnt sound like your kind of game...

Funny how you will attack ME instead of responding to what's on the board.

Look, i will defend anyone who plays an offbeat opening over more mainstream stuff when they understand the objective and subjective risks and are prepared to do their homework and know when to fold (some stuff is not worth playing period, other stuff is hope chess, other stuff is playable in select situations, some stuff can be played on a main repertoire if you willing to put in the work required). They are even players of the highest caliber from morozevich to rapport who seem to have made half their repertoire on really weird stuff. i dont think i have ever played 1.e4 or 1.d4 in a rated OTB game .
im not attacking you. I am attacking your thinking which has the flexibility and consistency of petrified wood.

but its like you made your entire personality around playing one system as the same system no matter what your opponent throws at you. Some openings are more forgiving than others at doing this but to insist on this is BAD chess. If someone buys a course on the hippo, it is not to join a cult of worship on a 10 move formation but to play interesting chess. No one gives a damn if the hippo suggested is only an 8 move hippo and not a 10 move one. The fact you gave a bad review mostly on these grounds shows something very suspect in your thinking.

and i sympathize to a small degree with this zeal. Sometimes the rebel purist in one will insist on a certain interpretation on an opening past reason. I recall like 10-15 years ago undergoing a small crisis because one of my preferred defenses was objectively refuted by the engine and my attempts by keeping them alive where shattered when a rival master of mine played right into that line and crushed me in an OTB game with my prep to keep it breathing.
( it was the declined variation of the nimzowitsch defense, 1.e4 nc6 2.d6 nf3 3.d4 nf6 4.nc3 bg4) basically, the way this was played for black was very pleasant if white responds with natural moves but if white knew the refutation of h3, be3 and d4-d5 the eval was BAD. It was one of the reasons the main player of this, Tony Miles had to virtually abandon it in the 90's. The only way to play this in good conscience was to accept a worse position which went agaisnt the original way to play this (black usually went, bg4, e6, d5 like a french where the bad bishop escaped captivity) and swap bishop for knight for no good reason, and hold a symmetrical endgame vs two bishops vs two minor pieces. My opponent crushed me in that endgame when i thought it was only slightly worse for black. I had to rethink my opening.
I searched all the nc6 books at the time for someone with a real answer. None provided a satisfactory answer that matched my standard of objectiveness. Until i found Schyler's "the dark knight system" which answered my prayers at a a cost...schyler recommends the declined nimzowitsch to be played like a pirc/KID with d6, g6, bg7 and aiming for early e5. This book actually passed the litmus test and the engine evaluated the lines quite favorably for an offbeat opening. 
I resisted this. Thats not a real nimzowitsch! thats not original! thats just a quirky pirc i thought to myself. I wanted to leave a bad review condemning him for insulting the nimzowitsch defense banner. A sell out, a traitor to the cause, until i gave the book a chance. Ironically, i only did at first to try to condemn his approach on objective grounds but i coudnt, it was well written lol. I had to accept i either adapted to accept this or i would have to learn to transpose to double king's pawn (the true selling out of the nimzowitsch defense) or abandon it all together. So i gave it a chance and have had good results with it since.

Actually, the database now shows that if you include transpositions, the nimzo-pirc approach is actually fairly popular even at the highest levels (although mostly in rapid). Plenty of very strong players have tried it out and a Few like Christian Bauer have made it a specialty of theirs. 
the moral of the story is to fall in love with doctrinal interpretation of openings when all the objective factors have betrayed you. Chess punishes that severely.
now, i still play the nimzo pirc as my main reply, but am ok with playing 2.e4 nc6 2.d4 e6!? with an offbeat french i used to condemn but with early f6 is acceptable and im ok with certain funky lines of the ruy lopez with black as well ( i play the old steinitz with early g6 ideas, but i am also learning the cozio).

Or in my case, 1 e4 d6 2 d4 Nf6 3 Nc3 e5 ... That's not a real Philidor! ... I got over it.

It's okay to point out _these_ moves are a "real" Hippo and _those_ moves are "not". (Point it out once or maybe twice, please don't beat it like a drum.) There are many reasons for playing unorthodox openings, not everybody cares about playing a "real" system every time. I look at the final Hippo setup not as an ideal but as a template. If you don't know what to do, play one of the moves from the template. If you do know what to do, play that move instead, even if it means you will never reach the "real" Hippo.

Stell-Antoni vs Hillarp Persson 2010, posted above by @Hippo-Holmes, was funny because Tiger basically used the Hippo as a move order to reach "his" Modern setup (with a weird knight on e7 instead of d7). It just took him 23 moves instead of the usual 12 or so. Was it a "real" Tiger's Modern, or "not"? Tiger probably cared more about the win than the nomenclature.

Can anyone help me find the chess suitability requirements?

Also, am I required to adhere to a strict list of suitability requirements in order to play chess, or can I simply ask any NM that I run into on the way to my mental health appointments for permission?

I know now that it was so wrong of me to think I could ask questions and offer opinions about the Hippopotamus Defense in a forum topic entitled the Hippopotamus Defense.

I know now that I was wrong to think freely about these things and arrive at my own conclusions.

Can you ever find it in your heart to forgive me?

you can do whatever the hell you want, no one cares what you play .
you are just wrong, or worse, actively encouraging sub par play for zealotry to a system opening. If you right or wrong about nomenclature (if there is even a right or wrong here) is almost entirely an academic issue. insisting the hippo setup is fine no matter what even when the engine eval is approaching 1.5 is a recipe for some brutal loses.

There is this tendency, no doubt fueled by a school system that insists on this artificial division of fact from opinion to determine curricula and silence unwanted critical thinking , that opinions being a radically different kind from facts are somehow immune from the verdict of veridical considerations,but this is easily refuted by a careful analysis of what opinions actually refer to, or rather the fact "opinions" dont have a single referent.
what we call opinion refers to a family of like 6 different definitions, many often mutually exclusive and the only thing they have in common is that they contrast with facts in one aspect or another.
opinions can mean 1.speculation 2.subjective reports or states 3. beliefs that may not require substantiation 4.faith 5.taste and preference 6. individually created judgement. Notice how they all have more in common with what they contrast with than anything truly shared in common.
Nothing about an opinion automatically creates immunity from refutation. Some opinion are in fact better than others. When we listen to experts that disagree with one another , we are tacitly admitting this.
Unless of course ,all you mean by opinion is asserting your right to self expression with no regard to veracity, in which case, thanks for playing.