Incorrect moves

  There are many sites where the viewer is asked to solve a chess puzzle and such and is told  to drag the pieces to solve it.  In most of these cases, if you try to drag a piece other than the one the programmer wants you to move, you are given the message, "Incorrect move!"

    No legal move in chess can be incorrect! If it was, there would be no games played! It's all a matter of opinion!

    This really irritates me! The programmer is not the final arbiter of what legal moves are correct and what moves are not. The player is!

frankxhalliwell@gmail.com

I think it's safe to say some moves are objectively better than other moves.  Some moves are objectively bad or losing.  Some moves are objectively the fastest way to a forced win or forced gain of material.  The syntax of "incorrect move" or "wrong" that you have a problem with is just a convenient way of saying "you didn't make the best move in this situation."  A common shortcut in the English language.

Of course, I've seen problems where it's not as clear cut as whether one move is objectively better than the other, however, it seems as though in at least 9 out of 10 of these puzzles (so to speak) it's pretty clear.

Opinions:

   We all have them, but in my view, people should be allowed to make their own mistakes and not be forced into the bigheaded view of the person that is programming these things! If you play chess, you'll know that there are many ways to accomplish your end!

"White to play any legal move".

I like it.

well your point is really invalid.

the point of puzzles are to make you find a winning position (through the winning of material, forced mate, or just a crushing position).

also, the point of puzzles are to find the fastest way to mate (just an example), I don't care if you say that there are so many ways to accomplish your end. the fastest way is always the best. if you found a mate in 297, and you missed a mate in 1. you can't argue because you still found the mate, just an extra 296 moves. that's just really dumb, if you want to advocate a longer line that reaches the same result.

also, puzzles are meant to improve you. you aren't going to improve if you keep saying "hey, my move works too, it's just 24321 times longer!"

you have to realize that puzzles are supposed to help you, and they just do that by making you try to find the correct move. if you do a puzzle, and you mess up on it, or get it incorrect, you should study the puzzle and see why you got it wrong. 

and yes, in chess, there are incorrect moves.

take this for example. 

white has a mate in 1, so the correct move is Qxf7#. but you can't say that Qxe5 is correct too, because altough it wins a pawn. black still has an ok position after be7. you may argue that now you are up a pawn, but I will say that my solution is better because I have checkmate.

so to sum it all up, puzzles are meant to help you improve, and you aren't going to improve trying to aruge about incorrect moves. so what if it's incorrect? everyone makes mistakes, nothing's wrong with that. what's wrong is repeating the same mistake over and over again. and yes, in chess (most positions) there is only one correct move. 

Nothing about a move that forces a mate in 1 vs a move that doesn't force a mate in 1 is an opinion.  That's a fact of the position.  Same goes for other winning moves found in puzzles.

um... is the OP actually serious or is he just joking?

But in case you are serious, the easiest way to fix your problem is to have the chess.com programmers change the "incorrect move" message to "not the best move," and problem solved.

The same thought crossed my mind, but I decided not to say anything. But I imagine there's a troll or two out there who's jealous that he didn't think of the topic first.

iN YOUR NOT VERY HUMBLE OPINION!