The board game Arimaa

We’ve started watching The Queen’s Gambit on Netflix (2 eps in, decent enough) and it made me look up chess computers.

Deep Blue mentions this game Arimaa which apparently was developed to be hard for computers to play but easy for humans and playable with a chess set

I’ve read the rules and it seems quite complex.

Anyone ever played it?

Not heard of this but I do think chess is due a renaissance and the television show you mention, which I’ve noticed a fair few people pick up on, may push chess back into the public eye.

I had a Kasparov chess computer around the time he played Nigel Short. I used to really love playing against it but sadly I’m not that good at chess. I did pick up a chess set of pieces that were exactly the same as I had when I was about 8 years old only last week from a charity shop. Ordered a board online and waiting delivery.

It’s a great sadness for me that I cannot enjoy the game of chess.

But unfortunately it locks me into huge anxiety because there is no luck at all. This paralyses me because I know that each move I make could actually be setting me down a path where I will lose, and moreover I could, if I thought hard about it, work out every move the other player makes so failing to win is entirely down to my lack of ability.

The last time I played was March 2004 in Egypt when the three guys I was was with were playing it and convinced me to play them all. I played two of them and somehow managed to win but never got round to playing the third guy (who would have definitely beaten me because he’s absolutely insanely clever and mathematical). Prior to that I don’t think I’d played since the 1980s.

I’ve not played properly for absolutely years (decades) but did look at Chess on the PS4 prompted by picking up them chess pieces I mention last week.

The good thing about that Kasparov computer I had was it actually was teaching me to get better (circa 1993). It was actually a really nice inexpensive piece of kit and I looked at it on eBay last weekend. I can see these kind of items taking off again.

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