Playing chess against a computer is a first for the game; For over 1,500 years, chess has been a game played and enjoyed by royalty and commoners alike. The rules of chess are basic and mostly simple, but the intricacies of the game make it difficult to master. Now that we are in the information age, we have used the computer very effectively to improve our chess knowledge and skills. Both computers and humans can be great opponents, and both have their advantages and disadvantages. Let’s explore playing chess against a computer and compare that experience to playing against another human being.
Nowadays when we play chess against a computer it is usually a computer chess engine available online. An immediate advantage of playing chess against a computer on the Internet is that the computers are always available and working. We’ll never have a problem finding a computer skilled enough to play against it. When computers play chess, they reason through brute force: they consider every possible move, from the next one to multiple moves. While that means computers are smart players, they’re not intuitive; sometimes it takes a human being to envision a genuinely innovative or unique path to victory. When playing chess against a computer online, you can use its analysis capabilities on your own behalf: enter a position that gives you trouble and ask the computer to analyze and produce the best options. In general, playing chess against computers on the Internet can be a challenging and learning experience, but it lacks the thrill of testing your wits against an opponent.
Playing chess against computers is not the best way to play
There’s a sense of anticipation when you sit on the other side of someone else’s board. Either one can make a critical mistake that a computer would never make. Your game could be so unbalanced that, in their confusion, your opponent makes critical mistakes. And when you play in person, there are psychological effects: looking into his eyes, reading his body language, and the like. When playing against another person online, these aspects are missing, although you will be able to start a game at any time, day or night.
When playing against a computer, your improvement comes from pure analysis: maybe you should have moved a different piece on move 34. With a human opponent, a broader and deeper discussion is possible. What were we thinking and how could we think and act differently to improve our strategic approach? How could we have avoided a tactical misstep?
Finally, there are the tactile sensations related to holding the pieces and feeling them slide across the board. Playing a beautiful game of chess with well-crafted pieces is an experience that a computer opponent cannot match. And so while there are certain benefits to playing chess against computer opponents on the Internet, the richest and most rewarding chess experiences are against humans, face to face.
