From: bogin YAHOO CO JP> Date: 15 oct 2002 Subject: Re: How to play shogi on the web? I believe one of main attractions of the Yahoo! Japan Shogi site is the chat function. It is much more easier to use than both Java Shogi and Shogi Club 24. It's like any other Yahoo! games server: It's a basic free for all with the majority of the conversations about anything other than shogi. Since the main chat board appears on everyone's screen you'll see the messages whether you like them or not. You can always block a particular user but since quite a lot of the people on this list do not speak Japanese anyways they probably won't mind either way. Java Shogi has a nice Chat function but you it's much harded to talk to everone at once. You have to select the everyone you want to send a message first and then type it out and send it. Shogi Club 24 has a very basic chat function. I believe that you only can talk during a game and only with your opponent or the other people watching. Too many people use that server so it just doesn't have the capacity for a full chat function. Also, another reason why Yahoo! Japan Shogi get's a lot of people is the time control function. You can sent any time control you like so you will see a lot of 1 1, 2 1 games. With Shogi Club 24 you only have 1 30, 15 60, 60 60 and Java Shogi starts with 10 0 and goes up to 60 60. So, there's much more freedom with respect to time controls. Finally, unlike Shogi Club 24, both Yahoo! and Java Shogi allow you to decided if you want to be Sente or Gote. Java Shogi has a furigoma function and a change side function but Yahoo! doesn't. At Shogi Club 24 it's already built in so furigoma is done automatically at the start of the game. So, for people who want to play either only white or black then Yahoo! is better than Shogi Club 24. All 3 have there own rating system. Shogi Club 24 has it's own league tournaments. It also has various other events. Java Shogi has weekend tournaments ( but no one seems to bother these days ) and sometimes a big year end tournament. If you want rated games then Shogi Club 24 and Yahoo! are your best bet. Java Shogi used to have lot's of rating games goin' on before but now there are hardly any. Probably, because on the other 2 sited the results are recorded automatically but on Java Shogi you have to go to another page and enter in everything manually and then the result is recorded. Also, both Yahoo! and Shogi Club 24 have an automatic save function so if you're computer crashes and you can get back within a certain amount of time you can restart your game. If not then you'll lose on time. Java doesn't have this so you have to recreate your game from scratch using the free mode. Yahoo! doesn't have a handicap hames function that I'm aware of but the other 2 sites do. You can only play handicap games in the free mode on Shogi Club 24 so none of those games are rated. You can play rated handicap games on Java Shogi if you can find an opponent. Shogi 24's handicap function is really easy to use since it's pretyy much automatic. Java Shogi's is more complicated. You have to got to free mode and then actually remove the piece(s) using your mouse. I don't think it's impolite to challenge higher-rated players to a handicap game. There probably just thinking about there first move. They already know it's a handicap game is before that open the applet. There's a little screen that pops up when you challenge them. Of the 3, I think Yahoo is the easiest to use but I agree that Java Shogi's board is the biggest. In terms of strength, Shogi Club 24 is the strongest but the advanced rooms on Yahoo! isn't too bad. There are quite a lot of strong players (2100+) there in the evening. I've been able to get to about 1750 on Shogi Club 24 and about 1850 on Yahoo! so there's probably some difference between the too. For just some fun the Yahoo! beginner's rooms are fine but for really strong play you need to head to the advanced rooms. Java Shogi's rating system used to be pretty stong. There were quite a lot of strong players there as well but for some reason it just isn't as popular any more. Perhaps most people have migrated to the other sites. Java Shogi does have an English site but it hasn't been updated in quite a while. So, the information is kind of old. Shogi Club 24 also has an English site but again it's very basic compared to the Japanese site. Yahoo! Japan Shogi doesn't have an English function at all. Basically, the English sites are kind of a gift from the site operator so don't expect much in terms of explainations, BBS, and other stuff. You just get the basics. But, Java Shogi does post info about there big tournaments in English when they have them and they will translate your messages for you on the tournament BBS. So, that can be helpful. And, finally, all 3 sites are free. Bill Gaudry __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! BB is Broadband by Yahoo! http://bb.yahoo.co.jp/