Hippo opening

I’ve been watching the “chess giant “ on YouTube and recently started experimenting with the hippo opening for black and white, i love it, anybody else enjoy the hippo or have any tips?

How do you play it?

I don't know, can someone tell us?

I don't know what that is, can you post the beginning of a game with it?

Will the Cow ever be a superior opening?

From my very limited research, it looks something like this if that helps

I've been working on the Hippo opening, including some private coaching from Solomon. I'm very much a bad beginner player, so not sure how much help I can offer, but happy to try.

The intent is a "universal" opening, useful against anything White opens with. (But the Hippo can also be played as a White opening.) That's what drew me to it. As opposed to learning/memorizing a huge list of possible replies from White after 1...e5 or 1...d5, the Hippo aims for a single setup, fighting for the center afterward in modern defensive style. Since the "full Hippo" setup takes ten moves (it doesn't always take this long to go aggressive), we will be fighting for the center late, but with the advantage of a completely locked-down fourth rank, and a simple set of attacking ideas.

My main problem area so far, is anticipating White's troublesome moves. There are some moves that seem to only be well-defended in advance (e.g. Bb5 or Bg5 if our a6/h6 isn't played; knights to b5/g5 can be annoying). I tend to find myself playing catch-up a lot when I don't get "in front" of some of these moves. Note: a good player sees threats before they materialize, and I'm not yet a good player, lol.

The Hippo requires Black to switch from passive to aggressive on a dime. The primary complaint against the Hippo seems to be "it's too passive." But it doesn't stay that way! You have to be ready to convert to attacking chess with timing.

I also recommend his Hippo course. Lots of content and expanded ideas in there, including the four breakout/aggression move types we have available. I think the YouTube videos only cover two...? (d- or e-pawn push, and knight to c- or f-files, if I recall). He covers more ideas in the course.

Ngl this is what i played awhile ago and realized that unless you know exactly what your doing you can lose. plus if your opp knows how to play you get cooked, not bad but I suggest like the vienna or the french

I like Sicilian.

I do too, especially if you go on chessable there is how Carlsen does the Sicilian and it is OVERPOWERED

I used to just premove the hippo and wait out my opponent in 30 second

Looks like the most logical opening

@Ducky321PG are you talking about Magnus Carlsen's Sicilian? If you are, I would call the opening moves to the opening very passive (not too passive) and my favorite part, the last part, which gets aggressive and then the Be7 which falls back.

At the last tournament I played in I decided to use the hippo for both black and white. I came in second only because I made a huge blunder in my last game where I was actually winning. Otherwise I would have taken 1st place. I have been studying it now and working on it almost exclusively with my chess coach. Even he who is rated above 2200 has a very tough time and he knows I am going to use it so there is no surprise factor. In that particular tournament every player after the game said to me “I had no idea what you was doing “. As far as I can find there are only two books out on it. It was developed as a defense for black but I use it for black and white with ver good results. Some of the top players (even Magnus) have used it on rare occasions but as a defense for black. It is very easy to learn and if anyone wants to know more message me. I have been studying it for hours every day for about 2 months now. You can also start off with the new Cow opening and if that is not working easily transpose into the hippo. I know I am now studying this also.

Here is my latest game where I played the hippo as white https://www.chess.com/game/live/77851864815

For more information about the Hippopotamus Defense see, Alessio de Santis, The Hippopotamus Defense: A Deceptively Dangerous Universal Chess Opening System for Black. (Le Du Torri, 2018). ISBN: 978-90-5691-831-6

This book is available as an ebook on Amazon.com. Hope this helps.

I looked at the opening line and it is not the hippo, but Van't Krujis opening