From: Pieter Stouten <STOUTEN <at> EMBL <dot> BITNET>
Date: 20 aug 1990
Subject: Re: Macintosh Shogi Program...

On Wed, 8 Aug 1990 23:20:33 CET, Brandon Freels
<BRANDON <at> AARDVARK <dot> UCS <dot> UOKNOR <dot> EDU> asked the following about the Macintosh
Shogi playing program "Shogi 0.21":
 
>What I am interested in is others opinions about this program. One question I
>have is DOES THE PROGRAM EVER DROP PIECES? There were many times in a game I
>was playing last night where the computer could have avoided a touchy situation
>by dropping a piece, and he could DEFINATELY have avoided the checkmate by
>doing this.
 
My impression is that the problem is very weak, but absolute beginners can
have fun playing against it. It does never drop pieces (!) and its opening is
invariably primitive Nakabisha (primitive Central Rook: R5h or R5b on the
first move). I went to the limit with the program: I captured all his pieces,
but left him with some pieces in hand. Then I put his King in a stalemate
position (although stalemate does not exist in Shogi and whyever should it ?)
and even then it just moved the King to be captured on the next move instead
of making a drop. I'll forward a copy of this mail to the author. He might
be able to do something about it.
Some more news about the program. The author Kengo Tsuruzono has made an
English version (especially for us, SHOGI-L subscribers !) and is currently
working on an English ReadMe file. After I have received the lot, I'll
upload it to the SHOGI-L archive.
 
Pieter Stouten <stouten <at> embl <dot> bitnet>