I've gone to chessacademy.com before to see if this existed and it didn't. Thankful it does now!
psst- it still doesn't ;)
Learn to play chess online
11–20 of 72 posts
Re: Learn to play chess online
#12Re: Learn to play chess online
#13I wish I had learnt to play when I was younger, i.e before my teens. I learnt as a teen while in secondary school, and it came at a time where I needed to learn some mental discipline.
In high school we used to coach younger kids from a neighboring primary school. Some kids would be all over the show, but the ones who did well picked up quite well. A few of them made provincial school tournaments, and fewer would make nationals. The gap in our training would then be apparent at that level because they'd be playing against kids who are learning enough chess theory, i.e endgame theory.
We once had someone in our team leading in material, but fail to mate her opponent, so sad yet funny because it was like a witch hunt, chasing the opponent king all over the show with a few pieces. We hadn't taught them some endgame tactics.
I think chess is one of those games that many people should try out. I'm glad I had a friend in the game when I went through painful teenage years.
Re: Learn to play chess online
#14It's often instructive to watch great players play chess. ChessNetwork has a series of hundreds of videos in which he talks through every move of the games that he plays. I encourage budding chess players to check out his Youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/ChessNetwork
Re: Learn to play chess online
#15Is there anything similar for Go?
goproblems.com gives you adaptive problems.
Re: Learn to play chess online
#16I wish I had learnt to play when I was younger, i.e before my teens. I learnt as a teen while in secondary school, and it came at a time where I needed to learn some mental discipline. In high school we used to coach younger kids from a neighboring primary school. Some kids would be all over the show, but the ones who did well picked up quite well. A few of them made provincial school tournaments, and fewer would mak…
> The gap in our training would then be apparent at that level because they'd be playing against kids who are learning enough chess theory, i.e endgame theory.
Openings are a vast area of theory as well.
I played competitive chess in my teens for a bit (my neighbor was insanely good at it and I got better just by being his punch bag) and I always refused to learn any theory. I think it's comparable to cheating on a test, it's supposed to be a game and a puzzle and I would feel the same if I learned how to solve a puzzle by memorizing solutions from a book.
Re: Learn to play chess online
#17I wish I had learnt to play when I was younger, i.e before my teens. I learnt as a teen while in secondary school, and it came at a time where I needed to learn some mental discipline. In high school we used to coach younger kids from a neighboring primary school. Some kids would be all over the show, but the ones who did well picked up quite well. A few of them made provincial school tournaments, and fewer would mak…
> The gap in our training would then be apparent at that level because they'd be playing against kids who are learning enough chess theory, i.e endgame theory. Openings are a vast area of theory as well. I played competitive chess in my teens for a bit (my neighbor was insanely good at it and I got better just by being his punch bag) and I always refused to learn any theory. I think it's comparable to cheating on a t…
Yeah, we had openings, middle-game strategy, endgame, as well as tactics, in our roster.
I know there were Chess Opening Encyclopedias, someone once donated one to me, but we could never afford to buy much material as we were lacking in boards as a start. Our school never had enough to spend on chess, it was athletics, soccer and netball that were on the budget. I live in South Africa if it adds any context.
I once got suspended at high school for 'focusing too much on chess'. I happily obliged and told the principal that I'd stay at home and study on my own, within 2 days I was back at school, and continued with my chess :)
Re: Learn to play chess online
#18For those who already know how to play chess but want to get better (preferably quickly with minimal, targeted training), I wrote a guide called "How to Get Good at Chess, Fast" that hit #2 on HN: http://www.gautamnarula.com/how-to-get-good-at-chess-fast/
Re: Learn to play chess online
#19There was some chess tutorial going around online that I failed to properly bookmark. The tutorial was premised on the fact that for casual fun games, you shouldn't have to memorize a bunch of strategic openings and instead adopt some of the older methods of playing before everyone memorized everything. Does anyone remember this and have a link to it?
I don't know of the specific tutorial you're mentioning, but a good way to avoid memorized opponents is to play the London System as white, and a kingside fianchetto system as black.
In both cases you can play the same moves against virtually any opening and get a solid middlegame position.
Re: Learn to play chess online
#20Is there anything similar for Go?
Guo Juan's classes are fairly nice