ChessMaster: The Case For

It generally seems that most people on forums like these favour Fritz over ChessMaster, but I thought I’d put down a few reasons why I vote the other way. First, though, a couple of important points:

1. I estimate my Elo rating to be something in awe-inspiring 1100 – 1200 range. In other words, I’m a beginner. It may be that my requirements from a chess program change as I develop.

2. I have Fritz 11, Deep Shredder 11 and ChessMaster Grandmaster Edition (the latest version). I have no bias here, as I already own (and use) all three programs.

Here, I’m just comparing ChessMaster with Fritz:

1. Training Materials

To access the Fritz training courses, I have to have the disc in my DVD drive. This is mainly because the training shows clips of various great Grandmasters talking as they indicate variations on an electronic chessboard displayed in a separate screen.

To be honest, though, I don't actually need to see Kasparov as he talks - as long as I can hear him talking, and see the moves on the electronic chessboard, I'd still get the same benefit. I wish they'd allowed the voiceover to be saved to the C Drive, so that training could be accessed this way (without having to find and insert the disc).

The ChessMaster training is all saved on the C Drive (audio only). With Fritz, the materials themselves seem to be mainly 15 minute clips from much longer DVDs that you can buy separately - in other words, they fall into the 'infomercial' category. Unlike the ChessMaster equivalents, these exerpts are not part of a thorough training package, designed to take you smoothly from one level to the next.

Another advantage of ChessMaster training is the interactivity - the training continually requires you to work through tests.

2. Graphics

Most serious computer chess is played using a 2D board and, after some experimentation, I think I prefer the Fritz 2D board to ChessMaster's, although both are very usable. However, sometimes I like to play on a 3D board, so I don't forget what the pieces look like.

For 3D, I definitely prefer ChessMaster's boards. Fritz clearly does a better job of providing a photorealistic board, but it overdoes it to some extent. I have experimented with Fritz quite a lot to find the ideal settings, but even this is hard. It seems you can zoom in and zoom out to a ridiculous extent, and it's quite easy to move the board around when you don't intend to. Some settings stretch the graphics card too far, and glitching results. I find the simpler (though more pixelated) boards in ChessMaster easier to 'read' and work with.

3. Opponents

It's possible in Fritz (and Shredder) to customise the engine so that it, for example, develops the queen early, or undervalues knights. However, my experience is that I tend not to do this - it almost feels like cheating to tinker with these settings.

ChessMaster, however, specialises in having hundreds of 'personalities'. These may be nothing more than preset 'tinkered' settings, but they do make a difference. For example, I recently realised that I was completely unprepared for an opponent who develops his queen early and goes on the attack, because the other computer programs never do this. Even though it's a 'bad' opening, I lost a few games to this kind of attack from a particular personality.

The variety of opponents in ChessMaster helps me learn to cope with unusual approaches like this, which can (at my level) occur in real life.

There are other areas in which Fritz does better than ChessMaster - analysis seems to be a significant one. Most other areas seem to be a draw. Both programs come with massive databases of historic games.

People often say online play is a plus for Fritz, but there's nothing to stop a ChessMaster owner from buying access to the ChessBase server separately. Fritz owners eventually have to do this anyway, as the program only comes with free access for one year, and even that depends on where you buy the software from.

Anyway, that's my two cents...

From what I've heard, the only thing that Fritz has better than Chessmaster is analysis, and if you're going to buy an engine based on its analysis capabilities, you might as well go for Rybka 3. 

Greychild,

Like you, I have several different engines and interfaces but I agree that at your level (and mine) I think the best 'all in one' solution is CM. I do like to have the option to tinker and play with Fritz, Shredder, HIARCS, Rybka, et al, but for the first purchase especially for the beginner I'd recommend Chessmaster

Congratulations, you just earned the 12-year necrobump award!

microbump - just for the halibut...

You know, a bump of extremely short duration.

...a necro patzer.