From: "Randal J. Andrews" IX NETCOM COM> Date: 23 jan 1996 Subject: Re: notation Hello, friends! I think this discussion about shogi notation for Western people is becoming heated! I hope we can have different opinions and still be friends. > They have the culture, the history, >the players, the fans, the knowledge, and so on. > Don't be so quick unnecessarily to dismiss all this. No one is dismissing it. I have said before, the serious shogi student will discover the Japanese culuture and traditions of the game. To know these things is to appreciate the game at a higher level than merely playing the game could ever offer. > To hell with the history and >traditions, we just want more players ! > This is a very sad attitude. I hope it's not really true. It is NOT TRUE. But, millions of people enjoy chess in the USA and have no knowledge whatsoever of that game's tradition and heritage. These people ENJOY playing chess, however. But out of those millions come the very few who study and promote the game and add to that game's heritage. > $B!! (BI never cease to be amazed at how some fans want to mangle Shogi into >the image of western chess. They want to keep the same piece names as in >chess, same notation, probably even throw away the flat pieces and use >chess-type three dimensional pieces. (This is impossible for shogi, but chinese-chess is evolving in this direction). > The truth is that Shogi ISN'T easy, and it never will be. > It is one of the world's greatest and most complex games ! Shogi is EASY to learn. I can teach another person the rules in less than 30 minutes. Shogi is DIFFICULT to master. Not everyone who learns the game will become a master. Everyone who learns should enjoy it. You can make the learning process EASIER. For example, learning to speak Japanese is difficult, but learning to speak Japanese without ever hearing a native Japanese speaker speak the language would make learning incredibly difficult. There are easy ways to study shogi and there are hard ways. >It takes more effort than many other games, but the rewards you get out >out of it will also be that much greater. Part of the charm of Shogi is >that it ISN'T western chess. I'm sorry, shogi is chess and chess is shogi. These games may not be identical twins, but they are twins. How else can you explain that after just 6 months of seriously studying shogi, I can already defeat dan-level players from Japan? Am I a 41 year old shogi prodigy? No, I just played chess for 27 years and became very strong at that game. The analytical skills necessary for successful chess play are the SAME skills you need for shogi. > What is the evidence that using a notation more like western chess >bring in more people ? > We need to be concerned with the types of people who are most likely to >come to Shogi and what we can do to accomodate them while retaining Shogi's >heritage. I think the people most likely to come to shogi are chessplayers! Chessplayers are shogi's natural 'market', because these games are twins. If you hear chess players complain about chess you would readily say, "Well, if you don't like that about chess then you should learn shogi!" No one is proposing to destroy shogi's heritage. The discussion is to how best to portray that heritage in English or some other language. How many people in Japan play chess, but know nothing at all about shogi? I'm not saying that learning shogi first is impossible, it's just not likely. >As for a new notation system making all English books obsolete: > So what ! We are talking about a handful of books. A worthless point. > Look at all the old "obsolete" western chess books that used the old >descriptive notation. Even people who play only western chess actually >need to know several types of notation. This is true. Only 2 of 6 English books are still in print and not many are likely to acquire Shogi Magazine. Space Sano has an ambitious program to publish many books in English so they alone can decide the issue of notation. In 1983, a Japanese publisher put out 2 books in English (actually bi-lingual Japanese and English), and disappeared. Perhaps, it was due to disappointing sales, I don't know. However, the majority of non-Japanese people on this forum have expressed a preference for English names and notation currently used. When Toyota and Honda brought Japanese cars to the United States did they insist on selling right-hand drive vehicles, because Japanese people drive on the left side of the road? No, they did a marketing survey and adapted their product to suit the people buying cars in USA. When a seller insists on making a product while ignoring the demands and desires of the people he is selling to, risks having lots of unsold product. Don't forget shogi has competition from chess. It is not a unique game, in the same way that go is a unique game. Go has no twin. If you make shogi difficult to LEARN, then people may say, "Forget it. I'll stick to chess. I don't want to learn shogi, because it will 'hurt' my chess". But, maybe you can 'lure' them by making shogi familiar. "Well, gee, they have a Knight, Bishop.. and, oh, they can promote?!! That's intriguing, let me examine this game some more..." . You wouldn't believe how popular the chess-variant, 'bughouse' is. Bughouse uses the shogi drop rule. Chess fans just don't know how much they would enjoy shogi. That's where marketing comes in. There is a way to market shogi to western peoples and my feeling is that saying "The object of shogi is to checkmate the Gyok", instantly loses your prospective customer. >If foreigners could develop new material, no Japanese would hesitate to >adopt it. They will even admire such effort. They'll be glad from bottom >of the heart that foreigners have made efforts and given such nice gifts >for Shogi and all the world. I believe that new material is called the internet! This is how shogi will spread worldwide. Every other effort must be subordinate to the computer effort. Hopefully, all efforts will be unified and continuous. As I mentioned in a previous post, the representation of shogi pieces on a computer should be many and varied. It can be kanji, it can be shogi pieces with English letters, it can be chess- symbols etc.. It should be all of these things, so people can decide what they want and their opponent can decide what he wants and everyone is happy. Chess is popular in many countries, so the pieces are called different names in different countries. Why can't shogi be the same way? It already IS that way and nothing is going to change it. The fact that shogi developed in one country is an accident of history.