So I played against an old chess computer...

Hey all! Long while since I've posted anything, but I've been busy. However, I found an old "Systema Krypton Odyssey 2" chess set in a charity shop, and figured it'd be fun to boot it up and see what computers were like back in the day. It's from 1995 - just two years before Kasparov would lose to Deep Blue, marking the end of human dominance of the game - and looks like this:

I booted it up, read the set-up guide, and decided to have a game. I selected the engine's highest level, 72. It chose a french defense with black (already fascinating, as engines today would never go for that) and was already seemingly thinking on its own after two/three moves. The game went like this:

It was a really fun one, and I'll admit my play wasn't perfect, but the tricky French gambit-lines I like to use proved too much for the engine! I find it really fascinating, as, in the User Manual, Level 72 is denoted as "Advanced Level". I am not an advanced chess player, not by modern standards, and I find this moniker very interesting! Let me know your thoughts, and feel free to share any games you've played against old chess engines.

Yes, the problem with engines before the Garry match was that they were too materialistic. In fact, when Garry played a game where the engine did not take a pawn to accept the fate of all the counterplay about to happen, Garry thought it was cheating!

You need a girlfriend.

@bobby_max thank you for your concern. @lucyelfamalam I think he might be right, what do you reckon? 😂

lol....

@bobby_max (oh yeah, and she's better at chess than you)

Dw I've got him covered on that front

The very early chess computers, and I'm going back to the late 70s early 80s maybe, had some strange quirks. I recall one could never convert a king and pawn endgame. I recall on finding a winning line against one random defence, it would always lose in the same way when picking that defence if I remembered my move from the game before.
Chess computers weren't so good back them, but they certainly made you feel superior :-)

my first chess engine was a radio shack built micro computer endorsed by garry kasparov. it was rated 1800. this was 1988. it knew ever opening under the sun and to incredible depths. its nimzo indian was particularly very high depth so that if you made opening error the machine was strong enough to punish you and if it had a defense to some tactic i always found out way to late my attack was unsound. the 2000 rated version was stronger by far it seemed loving to play a tarasch defense with its isolani pushed to d4. the 1800 played Bb4 after Bg5 in the queens gambit.garry did not just wily nilly put his name on something.

I played my first computer chess game on my grandpa's old old SOL computer

@#9 - That is the same chess computer I have.

Thanks for sharing your experience!

Back in the day I had a RadioShack Talking Chess Computer. I didn't know anything about chess theory, but unbeknownst to me I learnt opening principles, middle game etc from its 'suggest button'. Later on, I played a friend at a school, and he asked me how I knew that opening (Four Knight's game was a favorite). Back then I didn't know what an opening was or that they had names lol. A game wasn't divided into parts you just played. Those were the days.

I think that the availability of chess engines has been both a huge benefit and an existential threat to chess. Objectively, engines have raised the skill level of everyone and especially top players. However, the risk of cheating and the ease of analyzing has fundamentally changed the game...

One thing you would also find is that top players are deliberately sabotaging their openings at times or are playing really strange sidelines just to beat others

Yeah you definitely see that, especially in short time controls. I mean this latest stuff with that early rook sacrifice is absurd!

Think only really magnus is properly playing utter trash openings in long time formats, like when he played the Polish in Poland...