From: Paul Smith ntlworld com> Date: 15 aug 2004 Subject: Re: Kanji-Less Shogi Sets = International Sets ? Where Available ? Your free subscription is supported by today's sponsor: ------------------------------------------------------------------- Amazing Diet Patch The fastest - Easiest way to lose weight! Try it now FREE! http://click.topica.com/= caacvgta2i6YsbnuqMaa/MyDietPatches ------------------------------------------------------------------- Hunter wrote: > Part of shogi's draw is its tradition. I entirely agree. And traditional shogi sets are beautiful and I hope that nobody would want to see them entirely replaced by some new "international"= shogi equipment. Martin wrote: > it takes three minutes for a normally intelligent person to learn to recognize the pieces I agree with that too. Does playing with traditional pieces make genuinely make it more difficult to learn shogi? I doubt it, if it does make any difference it must be marginal. Whatever sort of pieces you play with, you have to get used to them. My recollection of learning shogi was that it was= difficult to make any sense of the overall position, not that it was difficult to remember which piece was which. Hunter continued: > There's not a large audience out there waiting for the next (western) chess alternative But I think that the key question is - are there a significant number of people who are put off trying shogi because of the kanji? And from my personal experience (I could give various examples) I am confident that the= answer is yes. People *shouldn't* be put off by it, but they *are*. Shogi is a wonderful game and once people have played a few games they are likely to be hooked, and then they will play with whatever sort of pieces are in use. But I think that we are missing out on some people because they= never get to that stage, they never get over the hurdle of trying shogi at all. I have been to all the Mindsports Olympiads here in the UK over the past 7 years, and I have seen lots of people trying out different games, chess players trying out Oware, backgammon players having a go at Go and so on. I= t always struck me that not many beginners were playing Chinese Chess or Shogi, even though there were loads of chess players about (In Alexandra Palace in 2000 I remember seeing loads of junior chess players trying out G= o and I didn't notice any playing a game of Shogi). And I heard people commen= t that Shogi and Chinese Chess looked particularly complicated and odd. [I don't know if others at these events have a different view but that is what= I observed] I think it would be an interesting experiment to try out a "shogi" set made= to look as familiar as possible to Western chess players. My suggestion would be this. Have round flat pieces (like Chinese Chess pieces in shape) with symbols on for the pieces - the familar chess king, bishop, rook, knight and pawn symbols could be used with invented similar symbols for lance and the gold and silver generals. Have white on one side of the piece= and black on the other. Have some spare blank pieces to be placed under a piece to indicate promotion, checkers style. My prediction would be that if this sort of equipment was used, say at the MSO, to play shogi near to a lot of chess players, they would show a lot more interest. They would instantly recognise the game as something similar= to chess and, as they would find most of the symbols on the pieces familiar - and would probably understand what was going on with promotion -= they might be quite interested in trying to find out what was going on and may perhaps even try playing a game or two ... Of course I could be completely wrong (and perhaps others will tell me that= this has been tried before and does not work). But I think that here in the= UK (I don't know enough about what is happening in other countries) at leas= t there must be some untapped audience out there for shogi. Here we have as far as I can see chess doing really well - for juniors at least, with aroun= d 70,000 young chess players each year entering the UK Chess Challenge. And how many shogi players are there? I think that in the 2004 shogi championships there were only 6 players. It must surely be worth trying som= e new approach to attract new players. And I don't believe that having some special introductory shogi set to get people started with the game is incompatible with continuing to use traditional sets for serious competition. Paul Your free subscription is supported by today's sponsor: ------------------------------------------------------------------- Shop online for Discount Auto Parts: Mirrors Headlights Tail=20 Lights Bumpers Fenders Window Regulators Spoilers Altezza Lights=20 and a Full Line of Auto Body Parts. www.partstrain.com http://click.topica.com/= caacxyga2i6YsbnuqMaf/Parts Train ------------------------------------------------------------------- --^---------------------------------------------------------------- This email was sent to: = shogi-l shogi net EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a2i6Ys.= bnuqMa.= c2hvZ2kt Or send an email to: shogi-unsubscribe topica com For Topica's complete suite of email marketing solutions visit: http://www.topica.com/?p=3DTEXFOOTER --^----------------------------------------------------------------