It's probably accessibility more than "coolness". The learning curve in the beginning tends to make chess the thing that people want to learn but never quite get around to. There's also the point that a poker game will usually consist of a group of people and so there's a lot more talking going on.
Why is poker cool but chess is not?
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In how many movies have you seen cool guys playing chess? Pop culture sways things way in the favor of poker. I mean imagine James Bond playing chess in Casino Royale or those clowns in Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels playing blitz.
But when you actually play poker it can be very boring as it is a long time between good hands and you have to wait and wait and wiat.
And with chess you can play and move the pieces if you wish.
Nov 30, 2013
0
#25
ColonelKnight wrote:
In how many movies have you seen cool guys playing chess? Pop culture sways things way in the favor of poker. I mean imagine James Bond playing chess in Casino Royale or those clowns in Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels playing blitz.
I can think of at least one. Steve McQueen and Faye Dunaway playing one of the hottest games of chess ever in "The Thomas Crown Affair". She can checkmate me any time :)
Then I suppose the biggest reason is that chess never had to try.
Khzx wrote:
Chuckieman wrote:
Poker is more TV friendly than chess. If we can get chess on TV, it would become more popular for sure.
Boring is a big possibility, not everyone plays poker and not everyone plays chess, but when you're looking at a chess board then start to see funny lights, it's bad, chess is a long, long, boring game to put on tv if you're not that interested, at least players can make poker seem fun, yes i watch.
Classical chess is too long for TV, but rapid time controls or blitz could be entertaining with the right format and color commentary. If it is made into a reality show where players' personality is portrayed, then it isn't only about watching the game, it's about understanding the story of the people that play the games.
Here's an example for format, but I think it could be more entertaining if it is a reality show where the chess players with different personalities live in the same house and the call each other out in an elimination "Survivor" style format.
massaquoi wrote:
Yeah Chucky I was actually thinking the same thing. Like somehow "sensationalise" the chess to attract ratings. But you know, what would happen then if we did that?
All the chess geeks and "purists" out there would be screaming holy hell. So it could be a dammned if you do, dammned if you dont thing.
It has been done before. Ultimate fighting was a fringe sport 10-15 years ago, and what got it so popular was that they made a reality TV show called the Ultimate Fighter and put a bunch of fighters that had personality and ego on it (they were decent young fighters, though not the best). They live in the same house and did some crazy things but their behavior drew ratings, especially when animosity grew between cast members and they call out each other to fight in the Octagon. And now, UFC is mainstream and hugely popular both in the US and internationally.
Chess is a man-vs.-man sport like ultimate fighting. I'm tired of all these top chess players play nice. Nothing makes a chess match more entertaining than bad blood or a real rivalry. There must be context or else looking at chess moves alone will only appeal to the hardcore crowd. Have young master-level chess players with balls to talk some trash live in the same house and have an elimination style format. Feature their personalities and have one rapid or blitz game per episode, the rest featuring how they interact in the reality TV house.
ponz111 wrote:
But when you actually play poker it can be very boring as it is a long time between good hands and you have to wait and wait and wiat.
And with chess you can play and move the pieces if you wish.
But that's actually a misconception, a poker hand is niether good nor bad, it depends on a whole host of factors. What position are you at the table, how many players are likely to be in the hand, what are the blinds at, what are your oppenents playing styles, how far into a tournament are you if you are playing a tournament, what's your table image, what's your opponents propensity to bluff, stack sizes, hand quality, etc... Poker is much more complex than it seems on the surface. The saying "play your opponent, not your hand" holds very true in poker, at least in No Limit Texas Hold'em it does. Poker takes a different kind of intelligence than Chess. You are dealing with imperfect information, whereas with Chess both players are dealing with perfect information.
You can not call 52o a strong hand.
But I bet 8 x BB pre flop ( everybody called ) and all in on flop with it. Everybody folded:
I showed my cards of course. Making such bluffs provides liquidity to your game. And when your real hand comes, everybody will be all in:
This game lasted only 13 hands with a net profit of 4 x BUY IN and I only had a good hand 1 out of 13.
watcha wrote:
You can not call 52o a strong hand.
But I bet 8 x BB pre flop ( everybody called ) and all in on flop with it. Everybody folded:
I showed my cards of course. Making such bluffs provides liquidity to your game. And when your real hand comes, everybody will be all in:
This game only lasted 13 hands with a net profit of 4 x BUY IN and I only had a good hand 1 out of 13.
Great example of the psychology involved with Poker. It's not what you hold, but what your opponents think you hold. Of course, if you misread your opponents incorrectly, you, yourself are going to be the one crying all the way home. I think of Poker as 50% social engineering, 40% number probability and 10% just plain luck. Now, even the best hand in Hold'em Ace-Ace can get busted by a Flush, a Straight or a Set (a pocket pair hit 3-of-a-kind). Fact is, Poker is a tricky game. A strong Poker player must learn the Read, if you aren't good at Reading people by their minute Tells then your success at the Poker table will be limited. Chip stack preservation, good bluffing and bet-sizing are essential to winning at Texas Hold'em.
J_Young598 wrote:
watcha wrote:
Fact is, Poker is a tricky game. A strong Poker player must learn the Read, if you aren't good at Reading people by their minute Tells then stick to Chess because you'll get chewed up.
Speaking of reading your opponents: in correspondence poker I played a game in which one of my opponents became readable to me to the extent that with one hand I said to myself: he has a pair. But not only that: he has a pair of nines. I literally saw his cards and it turned out that he had a pair of nines indeed. ( I have to note that a pair of nines made no difference to the hand it could have been a pair of eights or pair of sevens without making any difference. But it was a pair of nines. )
watcha wrote:
J_Young598 wrote:
watcha wrote:
Fact is, Poker is a tricky game. A strong Poker player must learn the Read, if you aren't good at Reading people by their minute Tells then stick to Chess because you'll get chewed up.
Speaking of reading your opponents: in correspondence poker I played a game in which one of my opponents became readable to me to the extent that with one hand I said to myself: he has a pair. But not only that: he has a pair of nines. I literally saw his cards and it turned out that he had a pair of nines indeed. ( I have to note that a pair of nines made no difference to the hand it could have been a pair of eights or pair of sevens without making any difference. But it was a pair of nines. )
I also could read one of my opponents. On one hand I said to myself my opponent had AK of diamonds. I literally saw his cards and could see those diamonds glowing. I have to note that AK of diamonds made no difference to the hand it could have been AK of clubs or Even AQ of clubs without making any difference, but it was the AK of diamonds!
In my mind it was delightful to read his cards but I never told him and thus got to play against him many more times.
This, of course, was in "correspondence poker", where one deal [with about 10 players at the correspodnece table] could take up to a year.
GoEasyOnMeBro wrote:
Poker doesn't require hours and hours of research and playing to understand but chess does. I'm not saying that poker requires less skill than chess, but the fundamentals are easier to grasp.
Ok, I'll say it then...poker requires less skill than chess ;).
Never heard of correspondence poker. Anyways weren't there several chess VS poker threads on chess.com?
What about chess VS magic the gathering, poker vs magic the gathering, or all 3 games?
J_Young598 wrote:
ponz111 wrote:
But when you actually play poker it can be very boring as it is a long time between good hands and you have to wait and wait and wiat.
And with chess you can play and move the pieces if you wish.
But that's actually a misconception, a poker hand is niether good nor bad, it depends on a whole host of factors. What position are you at the table, how many players are likely to be in the hand, what are the blinds at, what are your oppenents playing styles, how far into a tournament are you if you are playing a tournament, what's your table image, what's your opponents propensity to bluff, stack sizes, hand quality, etc... Poker is much more complex than it seems on the surface. The saying "play your opponent, not your hand" holds very true in poker, at least in No Limit Texas Hold'em it does. Poker takes a different kind of intelligence than Chess. You are dealing with imperfect information, whereas with Chess both players are dealing with perfect information.
It is not a misconception. I used to play poker and do well and while you are waiting for hands it can be very boring, When you are "out" of a hand it can be very boring.
I do not agree a poker hand is neither good or bad. Some hands, say at the start of Texas Holden, you first two cards can be "keep" cards or
"throwaway" cards.I agree you can make a seemingly bad hand into a winner also. In addition to reading your opponents a good sense of math helps.
I understand all the considerations you gave in determining if a hand can be played but there are some hands such as 2 7 off suit and you have to bid early are throwaways. It is losing in the long run to bluff with such a hand after everyone passes and you are in the little blind.
MONEY
i think its because when random people watch poker they actually understand whats going on while chess and gm games people are clueless and have no idea why one side resigned. it helps poker as a spectatorsport
Mikhail Tal is the only one I have ever known of to bluff in chess and succeed...perhaps if more tried it, it would begin to rival poker. Also, if you don't go hustle in the park or at your local chess club, poker seems more lucrative and automatically more fun. Chess seems to be all hard work and little reward.
I think it comes down to monetary reward. More people feel they are more likely to win at Poker than they are to win at Chess at the top level. Therefore, poker is going to garner more watchers and players, at least competitively because the possibility of winning money seems much more likely playing poker than playing Chess. Poker is also more socially engaging, another reason it draws more leisure players than Chess. Simply put, Chess is a fun if not rigorous exercize, while it can be relaxing it does not share the same social, laid-back, good time feel of Poker. I will say though, that to win at Chess, it is far more intellectually rewarding than to win at Poker. The luck factor of Poker can turn even a bad play into a winning play but in Chess that is almost never the case.