More and more players are buying chess computers, and more and more chess engines are available to the public. In the past, chess "boxes" like the Kasparov series, Boris Handroid, and endless others were all the rage. Today, with millions of families owning powerful PCs, a simple CD takes care of one's chess "need" in a simple, inexpensive yet highly effective manner.

What engines are best? This is the question I'll be examining as I look at five of the most popular bits of software. Be warned! I am a computer idiot. Half the time I won't know what I'm doing, and the other half will have me thinking I'm in control, though I probably will be off-base there too!

However, I do know what I enjoy, I know chess, and I know a good deal when I see one; so heed my advice or toss it in the dustbin. In either case, prepare yourself for ultimate annihilation by all of the engines about to be discussed!

1) CHESSMASTER 5500: For only $35.00, this is a superb buy. This software offers you soothing music while you play, pictures of famous players and sets during setup (to get you in the mood), and a host of options involving strength, style, time settings, and the list goes on and on.

For whatever reason, I did experience some bugs. I couldn't make it give off a sound while moving, though I went into the appropriate box and clicked on all the proper bells and whistles. Because of this, it was in stealth mode, and I often sat there for several seconds before noticing that it actually did something! At one point things got even worse. I'd make a move that got out of book and the machine would just think and think, even though it was a five-minute game. I'd command it to move and it would ignore me. I tweaked all its other commands and they worked fine (so it wasn't frozen). But the blasted thing just kept thinking. Finally, I gave up and ended its miserable existence.

As I said earlier (given that the experienced bugs were peculiar to my system or were due to some form of stupidity on my part), Chessmaster 5500 is a giveaway for the price. It's slick looking (though things are a bit cluttered and the board may give its owner a claustrophobic feel), strong (though not as strong as the other machines that I'll be discussing!) and well designed. If you're a Class A player or below, why get anything else? This program should offer you humiliating defeats for years and years to come.

2) FRITZ 5: The makers of this software have declared that Fritz is stronger than most (or all?) of the other programs. Perhaps it does well when playing other machines, but it's clear to me that, in human vs. machine games, Fritz is a bit weaker (and in some cases considerably weaker) than some of the other choices. Nevertheless, I would not want to be without my Fritz!

Fritz 5 boasts the cleanest interface of any engine, and one of the nicest boards. Easy on the eye, all of its bells and whistles are simple to access. The feature I like the best is it's analytic spread, which enables you to analyze a line and have it automatically placed on a spreadsheet. Chess symbols (equal, White is slight better, winning, unclear, stuff like that) can be added at the push of a button, and sidelines blend in seamlessly with the main features of your work to form an instant book of your ideas!

Playing in a very tactical fashion, Fritz 5 tends to think it's winning as soon as it gets a material edge; it has almost no feel for positional pawn or Exchange sacrifices. Nevertheless, it plays blitz at a 2500 clip, and if you're not paying attention (even if you are rated 2500) it can thrash you unmercifully game after game after game.

At about $100.00, it's considerably more expensive than Chessmaster 5500, but personally I have no interest in owning Chessmaster while Fritz has a permanent place in my software collection.

3) CHESS GENIUS 5: This program is the other mainstay of my collection. It's design is perfectly adequate (though not as nice as Fritz's), but its main plus is its positional skills, which are far better than Fritz 5. In fact, after analyzing a complicated Exchange sacrifice for several days, I noticed that Fritz always thought the sac was unsound, while Genius saw and appreciated the positional ideas behind the sacrifice. For the blitz fanatics, Genius is clearly the stronger of the two. I can beat Fritz regularly if I really concentrate, but Genius is an incredibly tough nut to crack.

This is another $100.00 bit of software, but it's well worth owning if you like to use a computer for analysis. In fact, Fritz and Genius complement each other well, and I recommend that titled players pick up both programs.

4) REBEL 9: Rebel (also in same price category as Fritz and Genius) is highly respected by quite a few strong players. Cyrus Lakdawala, one of the best blitz players in the country, says that he tends to wipe out Fritz and Genius, but can't win a game from Rebel (he says it rips him tactically and he isn't able to avoid those kinds of positions; something he's able to do against the other programs). In June 1997, Rebel beat Grandmaster Jusupov in a match 10 1/2 - 6 1/2.. Clearly, this is one mean machine!

Rebel has all sorts of functions, but I more or less ignored them since I was mainly interested in its strength. Its interface, which is pretty easy to use, is rather ugly (far less appealing than either Genius or Fritz). Why not give the poor thing a face-lift?

Over all, I'm happy to own Rebel. It's nice to know it's there when you experience one of those "I want to get humiliated at all costs" moments.

5) M-CHESS PRO 7.0: M-Chess is now up to version 7.1, so I can't be sure how much of a difference that fraction can make. The version I have, though, is strong, though I don't consider it as good as Rebel (and I would guess that Genius may be a bit better too, though this might turn out to be a figment of my imagination). The interface is clumsy and the pieces are not to my liking.

To be fair, I haven't had a lot of practice with M-Chess, just because of that unpleasant interface. However, Seirawan told me how Grandmaster Larry Christiansen once played a series of blitz games with this program and "saw his whole life flash before his eyes." In other words, M-Chess bit the Grandmaster and wouldn't let go!

M-Chess actually has quite a list of amazing results: In the 10th AEGON event at the Hague (May 1995), M-Chess 5.0 beat Christiansen and Z. Polgar and finished with a performance rating of 2652! Other M-Chess victims over the years (and this was an old version!) are Grandmasters Rohde, Shabalov, Cifuentes and Wolff.

In my mind, the big news is M-Chess Pro's 7.1 new price: only $49.95. This makes it competitive with Chessmaster 5500. Chessmaster looks better and is easier to use, M-Chess is much stronger.

AN HONEST PERSPECTIVE:

In general, numbers can be created that make any one of the top machines appear to be the highest rated. One article had Genius as #1, another claimed that Nimzo had taken that spot. Other surveys claim that Rebel is top dog, and the debate goes on and on. The one thing that can be verified is that there are six programs that lead the pack: Rebel, Hiarcs, Nimzo, M-Chess, Genius and Shredder.

As I stated earlier, as far as cost goes, M-Chess and Chessmaster are best buys. Non-masters don't really need to pay much attention to this fight over computing power: Chessmaster will beat them like dogs for the rest of their lives. If you don't care about Chessmaster's more attractive (and user friendly) interface, then M-Chess offers you a bigger bang for your buck with a rating in excess of 2500 (Chessmaster 5500 is probably in the 2300 catagory).

Rebel is making lots of noise around the world, and could well be the strongest program available at this time (if you're a "bigger is better" kind of person). It's flaw is an ugly interface.

By far the most attractive programs are Genius and Fritz. Fritz has the best design of any engine I've seen, while Genius is stronger.

ADDENDUM:

More Info On Chess Engines.
Reactions: Readers Write

The following letter was sent to me by Mr. Richard Fowell. Anyone interested in chess engines should find the information that he supplies interesting:

Regarding your Five Chess Engines review.

A) Chess Engine URLs

Your readers might want to know where to buy these programs. Here are some URLs (see also "Where to Buy" below).

Fritz 5.0 - http://www.chessbase.com/ (publisher)
Hiarcs 6.0 - http://www.acc-ltd.demon.co.uk/ (publisher)
Rebel 9.0 - http://www.rebel.nl (publisher)
MChess Pro 7.1 - http://www.insidechess.com/software.html#MCHESS
ChessMaster - http://www.chessmaster.com/ (publisher)

B) Which Chess Engine is Strongest

You stated (in terms of rating) that: "The one thing that can be verified is that there are six programs that lead the pack: Rebel, Hiarcs, Nimzo, M-Chess, Genius and Shredder."

According to the Swedish Chess Computer Association (SSDF) rating list,
Fritz was catapulted into that group by the release of Fritz 5.0.

The SSDF has played over 800 games between Fritz 5.0 and other chess
programs at tournament time controls (40/2), and ranks Fritz #1 based on
those results. The SSDF rating list is at http://home3.swipnet.se/~w-36794/ssdf/.

When human-computer games are factored in, Fritz still fares well - it is #1 on the Selective Search list at http://www.elhchess.demon.co.uk/ehss.htm, and recently won the Ordix Rapid Chess Open ahead of 36 grandmasters (http://www.chessbase.com).

C) HIARCS

You commented that you found Fritz very tactical, and valued Genius for its positional skills. HIARCS 6.0 is a top-ranked positional program that can be purchased as an "engine" for Fritz 5.0. This option gets you the positional strength of HIARCS with the superb interface of Fritz 5.0. The standalone HIARCS 6.0 CD-ROM can be bought quite cheaply (GambitSoft lists it for $56), and HIARCS is the only top program that runs on both PC and Mac (both versions are included on the CD-ROM).

D) Which Chess Program is the best Buy?

There is some truly excellent free chess-playing software.
For PC users, Rebel Decade is a free (weakened 200 pts) version of Rebel -see http://www.rebel.nl. For Macs, Sigma Chess 4.0 Lite at http://users.cybercity.dk/~bst10651/ is a good choice.

For Macintosh users, HIARCS 6.0 is arguably a best buy. It is the only top-rank chess program that runs on the Mac, and the price is now $56 for the hybrid PC/Mac HIARCS 6.0 CD-ROM (see http://www.gambitsoft.com/gambit2e.htm).
My review of HIARCS 6.0 from the Mac perspective is at http://www.gambitsoft.com/chess/games/hiar6me.htm

E) Where to Buy

Since International Chess Enterprises is a retailer, they may not want you to post information about competing retailers. In any event, here is a list of three retailers with an extensive inventory of chess software. I have been happy with my purchasing experience from all three of these. In addition, the online descriptions, especially at GambitSoft, are quite informative.

1) Your Move Chess and Games (New York, USA)

2) GambitSoft (Rottweiler, Germany)

3) The London Chess Centre (London, England)

These retailers sell many chess programs besides those you mention, but here is their coverage of those you mention.

An impressive amount of useful information! Thanks Richard! However, I still feel that Fritz isn't as strong as M-Chess, Rebel, Genius Gold or Rebel (I never got to test Nimzo and Shredder).

Other points of interest for engine fanatics:
1) The version of M-Chess that I reviewed was 7.1.
2) Mr. Peter Klausler (and others!) sent the following letter which tells
the reader how to get some very strong free programs:

Dear Mr. Silman,

I liked your summary of the five popular commercial chess engines.
And I realize that a review posted on a web site that's at least partially supported by sales and/or advertising of commercial products is going to focus on such software... but I do wish that you had mentioned some of the great free chess software that's available out there on the Web today. I like using Bob Hyatt's Crafty program with the Winboard interface for chessplaying, and as an analysis engine with my own (shamelessly plugged!) CDB chess position/game database program. I am not a particularly strong player (yet), so it's hard for me to justify spending money for commercial software so long as the free stuff suffices. And I sure don't have anything against commercial software, I just think that the prices should reflect the value that such software provides over and above what can be had for free.

You can take a look at CDB at http://reality.sgi.com/pmk_craypark, where I've put a screen shot and some documentation. There are instructions for downloading Crafty in the on-line help for CDB.

The CDB program may be of interest to those of your students who would benefit from using a positional database tool to browse opening trees and to compare their own games against modern master practice, but who don't want to shell out the big $$ for software quite yet.

Final Comment, 5-3-02: Chess Engines have come a long way since this (rather old) overview. If readers have comments to make about where these engines are now, feel free to write in and share your knowledge with us!