Best Game Ever Played

Was Paul Morphy's Opera Game the best game of chess ever played? Few would think so, although it is excellent for teaching novices the art of the checkmate and basic opening principles? Maybe Adolf Anderssen's "Immortal Game" or his "Evergreen Game" stands above every great game played by masters today. Is one of these deserving of the title, "best game ever played"? Karel Traxler's miniature that gave his name to 4...Bc5 in the Two Knights Defense has piece sacrifices on par with Anderssen's classics. But, J. Reinisch's tactical errors should exclude Traxler's gem from consideration.

What criteria should we use to determine the best game ever played?

Twice, Chess Informant has surveyed its readers who voted on the best game ever published in Chess Informant. Twice, the same game has won. Is this game the best chess game ever played?

A great game for sure, but I like Morphy's Opera House Game much better. 

Maybe game six of the 1972 World Championship should be considered among the best games ever played?

And let's not forget about Kasparov's Immortal - the game he played agains Topalov in 1999. Many consider it to be the greatest game over played.

 Topalov missed 24...Kb6 or chose not to play it thus slightly dulling the games brilliance in my opinion.  While perhaps not brilliant I like playing through Diemer v. Trommsdorf (1973) (B07 Pirc)   If I had to pick a brilliant decisive game I'd choose R.Byrne vs. Fischer US Championship 1963/64 mainly because he fooled the commentators

#6. Averbakh spent a month of his life studying 14. Rad1 and Fischer's disclosed thoughts of ... Ne4 in reply to that.  Eventually Fischer replied to a line about a line in a variation not played.
Okay how about 14. ... Qc8 in reply to 14. Rad1.

I know this has been overdone but it's a good presentation.

I have figured out yet another thing this chess.com site is lacking, and why it is so overrun with trolls. There is no easy way to report them. In fact, there is no easy way to do anything on this site, except maybe troll.

Maybe "The Game of the Century"? You can read about it on WiKi:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Game_of_the_Century_(chess)

I like Fischer -- Stein, which was voted the best game of Chess Informant 4. So, that gives us three candidates played by Fischer.

The Mammoth Book of the World's Greatest Chess Games
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708233403/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review782.pdf

The 100 Best Chess Games of the 20th Century, Ranked
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708234327/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review246.pdf

I have the Mammoth Book. Mine has 100 games, but a more recent edition expands this out to 125 IIRC. My edition explains the voting process and lists the scores. Two games received a perfect score of 15: Botvinnik -- Capablanca, AVRO 1938 and Karpov -- Kasparov, Moscow 1985 (16th match game).  

I'll look at the other list.

#2 on Soltis's list is certainly one I would include in any list of the five to ten candidates.

Thanks urk, that was an interesting take on a true classic. 

My 50 minute class on "The Greatest Chess Game ever played" for ICE's Spring Break Chess Camp  is Wednesday 10:00-10:50. I will have the complete game scores of my candidate games and may present two of them quickly. My current list in no particular order:

Ivanchuk -- Jussupow, Bruxelles (m/9) 1991 0-1

Topalov -- Anand, Sofia 2005 1-0

Karpov -- Kasparov, Moscow (m/16) 1985 0-1

Fischer -- Stein, Sousse 1967 1-0

Bogoljubow -- Alekhine, Hastings 1922 0-1

Fischer -- Spassky, Reykjavik (m/6) 1972 1-0

Kasparov -- Topalov, Wijk aan Zee 1999 1-0

Botvinnik -- Capablanca, AVRO 1938 1-0

Byrne -- Fischer, New York 1956 0-1

Polugaevsky -- Nezhmetdinov, Sochi 19658 0-1

I nominate the game in post #50 of this thread:

https://www.chess.com/forum/view/game-showcase/amacing-victories-by-macer75?page=3

I call it my Evergreen Game.