Rating: 
Summary: Very good for a first-time chessmaster user, but...
Review: I've been using Chessmaster6000 since 1998 and I always liked it a lot. The program not only looks very nice (which can't be said of all major chess programs) but also is very "playable", whether you want to just play chess, improve your game, analyse, study theory or whatever. This being said I have to admit that I'm not really impressed with Chessmaster7000. The division in "rooms" is very nice (if you want to analyse you go to one room, if you want to work with databases you go to another and so on) and works very well. With these rooms you easily get where you want. If you have children in the "chess learning age": there's a childrens room where kids can learn and/to play in a way that looks good to me. But again, apart from these rooms Chessmaster7000 doesn't add much to the functionality of Chessmaster6000. So I'd say : try to define what you expect from Chessmaster7000 and then decide if you want to buy.PS: if you use Chessmaster6000 to play via MPlayer.com, you have no choice but to buy 7000 (almost anybody else does and aparently you can't use 6000 to play against someone who's using 7000.....:-(
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent application that could use some improvement
Review: I've owned and used all the Chessmaster programs beginning with Chessmaster 2100 including Chessmaster 3000 for the Mac. The program has gradually become stronger and stronger, from perhaps something like a clueless class D player to something like a grandmaster. The engine in this program on today's fast machines can play five-minute chess as well as all but the top grandmasters, and at whatever time limit as well as an international master. However the ratings given for the various personalities need to be taken with a grain of salt and some understanding. I'll get to that in a bit. First there are still in the program some annoying bugs and some plainly bad programming practices. Most annoying to me is the fact that the games are not automatically saved; worse yet, you are not even asked if you want to save the current game. This is contrary to standard practice in virtually all applications that I am familiar with, and I wish that Chessmaster would do something about it. Next, when you do save a game under a name you choose, should you need to save it again after some further moves, you are given as the default not the name you chose and are using, but the regular CM default (players and date). If you play two games on the same date with the same players and same colors, CM will suggest the name of the first game when you try to save the second game. If you don't intervene, you will overwrite the first game. Not good! The database is not as well constructed as it might be. You can only view the games directly in the database mode from the White side on a small board. Also there is a bug that sometimes skips a move when you hit the "forward a move" button. Nonetheless, a database of almost half a million games (with some repetitions) is an invaluable resource. By the way, I have played over many of the games and so far have found only a couple of obvious errors. There are others I'm missing of course. Some of the Fischer games that were adjourned I noticed are scored as not completed when in fact one of the players (usually not Fischer!) resigned without resuming play. The rated games format allows one to adjourn a game and then later delete that game and thereby "cheat." If you are clearly lost in a rated game, you can adjourn it and then never call the game up again and avoid the rating point loss. You can even delete the file. (Just a tip to those who like to cheat at solitaire, and a warning to take anyone's rating against Chessmaster with a grain of salt.) The rated game feature might be better if no adjourned games were allowed, or if allowed, require that they be finished by some date (as in the old real world of chess) or rated as lost. A nice improvement from earlier editions is that the Think Lines window shows the moves in figurine notation and they are numbered so it is much easier to read them. A further readability improvement would be to put commas in the number of positions that Chessmaster has considered. The personalities (one of CM7000's best features) are still a work in progress. The ratings are derived from play against the machine and not against human players, which is why they are a little weird. Still, just because the personality makes weak moves on occasion, moves so bad logically and positionally that even a "C" player would never make them, doesn't mean that the personality isn't stronger than a "C" player or even an "A" player. This is because even though it makes silly moves it more than compensates by seldom making any tactically blunders. In fact, the "strangeness" of the personalities stems from the fact that CM has not really worked out how to weaken the personalities in a humanoid way. Most human players tend to overlook a two-move tactical point from time to time. (Less than expert players probably do it on average at least once a game.) And few human players below the master level go through a game without making a tactical error somewhere along the way that loses at least the equivalent of a pawn. What the CM program needs to do is program their personalities to make human-like tactical errors and fewer positional monstrosities. I also think that CM ought to allow a personality or even itself to resign when it is clearly beaten. Chess programs typically do not resign, of course, no matter how bleak the outlook. Why? I'm not sure, but I think one reason is that it's impossible for the program to know when the situation really is hopeless. Since humans are always prone to error (even grandmasters have allowed mates in winning positions) and since the program never gets tired, why resign? But "resigns" is a gentlemanly way to end a game. Note that in games against grandmasters, the programmers resign for the program when it is hopeless. One way to incorporate "resigns" into the CM's vocabulary would be to allow the user to set a criterium of futility, say two and a half pawns. (Complexity of position could also be considered.) Or CM could take into account the rating or previous play of the player and make an assessment. Despite these suggestions for improvement, the bottom line as far as I am concerned is that CM7000 is a great application, a source of entertainment, competition and instruction that chess players just a few years ago could only dream about.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent application that could use some improvement
Review: I've owned and used all the Chessmaster programs beginning with Chessmaster 2100 including Chessmaster 3000 for the Mac. The program has gradually become stronger and stronger, from perhaps something like a clueless class D player to something like a grandmaster. The engine in this program on today's fast machines can play five-minute chess as well as all but the top grandmasters, and at whatever time limit as well as an international master. However the ratings given for the various personalities need to be taken with a grain of salt and some understanding. I'll get to that in a bit. First there are still in the program some annoying bugs and some plainly bad programming practices. Most annoying to me is the fact that the games are not automatically saved; worse yet, you are not even asked if you want to save the current game. This is contrary to standard practice in virtually all applications that I am familiar with, and I wish that Chessmaster would do something about it. Next, when you do save a game under a name you choose, should you need to save it again after some further moves, you are given as the default not the name you chose and are using, but the regular CM default (players and date). If you play two games on the same date with the same players and same colors, CM will suggest the name of the first game when you try to save the second game. If you don't intervene, you will overwrite the first game. Not good! The database is not as well constructed as it might be. You can only view the games directly in the database mode from the White side on a small board. Also there is a bug that sometimes skips a move when you hit the "forward a move" button. Nonetheless, a database of almost half a million games (with some repetitions) is an invaluable resource. By the way, I have played over many of the games and so far have found only a couple of obvious errors. There are others I'm missing of course. Some of the Fischer games that were adjourned I noticed are scored as not completed when in fact one of the players (usually not Fischer!) resigned without resuming play. The rated games format allows one to adjourn a game and then later delete that game and thereby "cheat." If you are clearly lost in a rated game, you can adjourn it and then never call the game up again and avoid the rating point loss. You can even delete the file. (Just a tip to those who like to cheat at solitaire, and a warning to take anyone's rating against Chessmaster with a grain of salt.) The rated game feature might be better if no adjourned games were allowed, or if allowed, require that they be finished by some date (as in the old real world of chess) or rated as lost. A nice improvement from earlier editions is that the Think Lines window shows the moves in figurine notation and they are numbered so it is much easier to read them. A further readability improvement would be to put commas in the number of positions that Chessmaster has considered. The personalities (one of CM7000's best features) are still a work in progress. The ratings are derived from play against the machine and not against human players, which is why they are a little weird. Still, just because the personality makes weak moves on occasion, moves so bad logically and positionally that even a "C" player would never make them, doesn't mean that the personality isn't stronger than a "C" player or even an "A" player. This is because even though it makes silly moves it more than compensates by seldom making any tactically blunders. In fact, the "strangeness" of the personalities stems from the fact that CM has not really worked out how to weaken the personalities in a humanoid way. Most human players tend to overlook a two-move tactical point from time to time. (Less than expert players probably do it on average at least once a game.) And few human players below the master level go through a game without making a tactical error somewhere along the way that loses at least the equivalent of a pawn. What the CM program needs to do is program their personalities to make human-like tactical errors and fewer positional monstrosities. I also think that CM ought to allow a personality or even itself to resign when it is clearly beaten. Chess programs typically do not resign, of course, no matter how bleak the outlook. Why? I'm not sure, but I think one reason is that it's impossible for the program to know when the situation really is hopeless. Since humans are always prone to error (even grandmasters have allowed mates in winning positions) and since the program never gets tired, why resign? But "resigns" is a gentlemanly way to end a game. Note that in games against grandmasters, the programmers resign for the program when it is hopeless. One way to incorporate "resigns" into the CM's vocabulary would be to allow the user to set a criterium of futility, say two and a half pawns. (Complexity of position could also be considered.) Or CM could take into account the rating or previous play of the player and make an assessment. Despite these suggestions for improvement, the bottom line as far as I am concerned is that CM7000 is a great application, a source of entertainment, competition and instruction that chess players just a few years ago could only dream about.
Rating:
Summary: Fantastic Chess Software Product.........but
Review: If you are a keen Chess player who wants a program that is highly interesting to play and study with - BUY THIS PRODUCT. The strength of the engine is absolutely superb. With a sacrificial, attacking style, it will play probably at 2500 level on a fast Pentium or Athlon - probably marginally behind the very strongest engines available. At blitz chess it plays at Grandmaster level. The graphics are superb and the range of features is excellent. In particular, the "Natural Language Advice" feature is unique and one of the best instruction facilities I have seen in chess software. Here, however, is my proviso. If you already have Chessmaster 6000, it is not worth upgrading as the engine is the same. Also, I still find it annoying that it cannot analyse a game Chessbase style. Let's hope this is in 8000!
Rating:
Summary: Fantastic Chess Software Product.........but
Review: If you are a keen Chess player who wants a program that is highly interesting to play and study with - BUY THIS PRODUCT. The strength of the engine is absolutely superb. With a sacrificial, attacking style, it will play probably at 2500 level on a fast Pentium or Athlon - probably marginally behind the very strongest engines available. At blitz chess it plays at Grandmaster level. The graphics are superb and the range of features is excellent. In particular, the "Natural Language Advice" feature is unique and one of the best instruction facilities I have seen in chess software. Here, however, is my proviso. If you already have Chessmaster 6000, it is not worth upgrading as the engine is the same. Also, I still find it annoying that it cannot analyse a game Chessbase style. Let's hope this is in 8000!
Rating: 
Summary: Almost Too Much!
Review: If you love chess, and you find it difficult to always have a playing partner, this game is your answer. I've had sessions where I play four or five games in a row, until late at night, and I take my time between moves analyzing what happened and thinking about strategy. Not many human players would put up with that! The playing levels of this game are above and beyond what almost any amateur chess player would need. I am willing to bet that at the toughest settings about 1 in 10,000 chess players could win consistently. I like "watching" the saved games, seeing the moves of famous chess players. I also like the rating system built into the game. The graphics are terrific, very realistic, and the moves are very smooth. The views are great. The only thing I would say about this game that is slightly negative is that there are almost TOO many settings -- adjusting the tilt of the board, choosing the color and "texture" of the board, choosing different sets of playing pieces. Also, you can endlessly tweak the personality of your opponent, making it more defensive, more offensive, more controlling of the center of the board, more protective of the queen, and on and on. I find I am always trying to adjust the settings. The best thing is to find a setting, then forget about settings and focus on the game. I tried the modem-to-modem chess games, but found it too slow for my taste. My chess game has definitely improved after using this game.
Rating:
Summary: Almost Too Much!
Review: If you love chess, and you find it difficult to always have a playing partner, this game is your answer. I've had sessions where I play four or five games in a row, until late at night, and I take my time between moves analyzing what happened and thinking about strategy. Not many human players would put up with that! The playing levels of this game are above and beyond what almost any amateur chess player would need. I am willing to bet that at the toughest settings about 1 in 10,000 chess players could win consistently. I like "watching" the saved games, seeing the moves of famous chess players. I also like the rating system built into the game. The graphics are terrific, very realistic, and the moves are very smooth. The views are great. The only thing I would say about this game that is slightly negative is that there are almost TOO many settings -- adjusting the tilt of the board, choosing the color and "texture" of the board, choosing different sets of playing pieces. Also, you can endlessly tweak the personality of your opponent, making it more defensive, more offensive, more controlling of the center of the board, more protective of the queen, and on and on. I find I am always trying to adjust the settings. The best thing is to find a setting, then forget about settings and focus on the game. I tried the modem-to-modem chess games, but found it too slow for my taste. My chess game has definitely improved after using this game.
Rating: 
Summary: Good program, lousy compatibility
Review: It is annoying that the hype says this is the "number one" chess computer game. It clearly is not, and the serious player should consider games such as those produced by Rebel (....) I find there is something amaturish about this game, and why does it STILL not run on windows 2000?
Rating:
Summary: Beginners Only
Review: It is annoying that the hype says this is the "number one" chess computer game. It clearly is not, and the serious player should consider games such as those produced by Rebel (....) I find there is something amaturish about this game, and why does it STILL not run on windows 2000?
Rating:
Summary: A real Master of a Program!
Review: It seems kind of dumb to review this program, now that CM 8000 is out. But here goes: This is a great program. I have spent many hours with this puppy. I am a USCF Master, and I have beaten this program (on its top level) only a handful of times. Of course the strength of the program will be based on the speed of your computer's processor chip. I.e., the faster the processor, the stronger the program. Some of the features I liked: A library of around 300,000 games!! A multiple personality, programmable playing engine. (There is almost an infinite variety of playing strengths here.) Josh Waitzkin's voice as he goes over some of his best games! (He explains the variations in great detail.) Josh will become your personal chess coach. You will definitely learn from watching his games and analysis.{See his victory over my friend, Moshe Khatena from a tournament in Bermuda.} I could go on and on. But by now, you should get the general idea. I can heartily recommend CM 7000 to ANYONE. If you don't like it, I will buy it back from you. [I won't promise to pay full retail, however. ;) ]
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