Thursday 5 March 2009

Suicide Chess

Amongst FIDE's Rules and Tournament Regulation Committee there is a debate about whether Chess 960 aka Fischer Random is equal to standard chess (and should therefore be listed in as an Apendix to the Laws of Chess) or is simply a chess variant, like Bughouse or Progressive Chess.
One of the arguments in its favour is the growing popularity of the game. But if popularity is the sole criteria then I suspect there is at least one chess variant that is ahead of it in the queue. Without basing this claim on anything more than gut feeling and personal observation, Suicide Chess (or Losing Chess) is probably more widely played today. Most of this activity may be on chess servers, or more annoyingly, in junior chess clubs (when the players should be concentrating on mastering real chess), but I'm sure that every chess player has played a fair amount of Suicide Chess at some point in their lives.
Of course there has been a big push for Chess 960 in recent years (and it is an event at this years O2C Doeberl Cup), but Suicide Chess also had some big name adherents. Here is a game where David Bronstein defeated Evgeni Gik

E.Y. Gik v D. Bronstein
1.e4?? d5 2.exd5 Qxd5 3.Nc3 Qxg2 4.Bxg2 b6 5.Bxa8 Nc6 6.Bxc6 a5 7.Bxe8 Nf6 8.Bxf7 Be6 9.Bxe6 Nd7 10.Bxd7 e6 11.Bxe6 Rg8 12.Bxg8 g6 13.Bxh7 c5 14.Bxg6 a4 15.Nxa4 c4 16.Nxb6 Bc5 17.Nxc4 Bxf2 0-1

1 comment:

OzChess.com said...

Suicide chess is the best Shaun.

I am the 2nd best suicide chess player in Australia. Just letting everyone know.

Suicide chess can improve OTB real chess, and one person I know credits beating Smerdon to his frequent suicide chess games, because it teaches you to look at more alternate lines of play.

Best Regards,

Alex Toolsie