From: Luke Merritt <clearobscurity <at> HOTMAIL <dot> COM>
Date: 6 feb 1999
Subject: Re: The larger Shogi variants

>We were having such a good "fight" over the discussion on whenever Tai
>and Taikyoku Shogi were playable games or not (or even games at all),
>that it seems a shame to let the subject die down. So this is my views
>on what makes a good large-Shogi variant.
>
~~

In my opinion, we could debate whether several games are really games,
not just shogi variants. For example, roleplaying games like Dungeons &
Dragons and Shadowrun...are they really games? They're not configured
like actual "board games", and certainly aren't played that way. Or any
of the really really huge wargames which sacrifice playability for
historical accuracy. I would rather attempt a game of taikyoku shogi
than try playing a wargame with thousands of tiny miniatures on a 4x10
foot table.

I'd have to have a physical set of these large shogi variants to
actually decide if I could play them or not (I plan on buying a tenjiku
and maybe a tai set soon), but I think that the larger the chess-type
game, the more playable it would be if lots of faerie powers were thrown
in. I've been toying with the idea of a 100x100 shogi variant, and I
feel that it would be necessary to include several pieces with very
bizarre movements, like capturing from a distance or range jumping hook
movers in order to make the game even appear to be playable. Of course,
maybe all that is because I'm rather eccentric.

Anyone can see that the smaller the shogi game, the more strategic,
while the larger you get, things break down into little skirmishes until
enough pieces are killed off as to even allow a mating situation. It
seems to be that taikyoku is more of a huge tenjiku than a step up from
tai, as pieces promote the more standard way instead of on capture (aye,
they even promote to more powerful pieces, not the annoying hook
mover-gold general situation). I think the game would probably start out
(for the first few days, he he) feeling more like tai shogi, then
gradually fade into a more tenjiku type feel. I by no means believe that
taikyoku could possibly be as short as some tenjiku games...I've played
with friends on the computer and since neither of us were very
experienced players, the games were short bouts of wholesale slaughter.
I did notice that taikyoku gave the king a little defense against the
fire demon by having it step move 2 spaces instead of 1.

I'm sure that was rather rambling and confusing...I just started typing
without an organized plan. Sorry about that. In summation, I think that
with some of the absurdly complicated wargames and roleplaying games out
there, even taikyoku shogi seems much more appealing.

--Luke

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