cheap selling price of the top programs, Houdini 4

[reflectionofpower]

I remember the days of paying $119.99 for M-Chess Pro,Genius,Gideon Pro like 15 years ago. I would buy them every time a new version came out. The open source programs have certainly been a gold mine for computer chess nuts but it obviously hurts those looking to make some coin off their hard work.

These were the days never the less
Dr.D

I remembering getting M-Chess and playing against it's pet line the Urusov Gambit, 1.e4 e5 2.Bc4 Nf6 3.d4 exd4 4.Nf3 You know the game is going to be a bloodbath. Gideon had many advanced features and I always liked how it played solid chess in every aspect of the game.

[D] rnbqkb1r/pppp1ppp/8/8/2Bpn3/5N2/PPP2PPP/RNBQK2R w KQkq - 0 5

I recall many wins at the time when M-Chess was using this lethal Bishop opening and scoring against a lot of chess programs with beautiful mind blowing games
Dr.D

I forgot to mention that at the time M-Chess started using learn files, something relatively new at the time among chess programs. I also had Martin Hirsch call me up out of the blue and we talked about chess and such for at least a couple hours. He was a cool, down to earth guy.

[OneTrickPony]

Isn't odd though that a chess program written by one or two guys would be at the same price level as a mainstream video game developed over a period of years, by huge dev teams and costing 100's of millions?

Small more specialized market: bigger price.
In poker people are selling software for several hundred usd which average programmer in this forum would put together in a week (and with more features and performance). That's how it is with niche markets.

[kgburcham]

Isn't odd though that a chess program written by one or two guys would be at the same price level as a mainstream video game developed over a period of years, by huge dev teams and costing 100's of millions?

Small more specialized market: bigger price.
In poker people are selling software for several hundred usd which average programmer in this forum would put together in a week (and with more features and performance). That's how it is with niche markets.

two good points, interesting
kgburcham

[kgburcham]

Stockfish is probably in the top three programs for now and is free, totally free, just download and play.
Komodo may be the strongest program for now and was extremely cheap at $30, almost nothing, a family of four meal at Mcdonalds. I send $80 to Saudia Arabia everytime I fill my Dodge pickup but got Komodo almost for free and I got stockfish for free.

So now how will Houdart price his Houdini 4 when it seems stockfish and komodo are just as strong?
it will seem weird getting Houdini 4 for free or almost free at $30.


I have been buying chess programs for years. A lot of money. They are all on the shelf in cases. I always buy the chessbase version when available in the case, so I always pay top dollar not the cheaper download version. I have bought two versions of Komodo 6 and 3 or 4 versions of Houdini 3.
If Komodo is released in a chessbase version then I will buy it and just put it on the shelf.
So I will buy Houdini 4 in the chessbase version even though it just lost a game with white in Tcec against the free stockfish, and it will probably be 3 times what Komodo cost even though it seems to be equal in strength to Komodo.
I will tell my wife that if I die before her, my chess program collection is worth $0 and to just throw it all in the trash. I assume most programs will start being free or real cheap from now on.
Since programs are going to be free or dirt cheap now, I hope chessbase can stay in business.

Oh well doesn't matter right? The cheap has started.
kgburcham

Haven't you already hammered this topic to death in a recent thread here?

Personally,I was so excited when Kim raised this topic here on our beloved forum and I don't mind getting started all over again

this is an ongoing issue, growing pains for our sport.
my two threads are minor compared to possibilities of the future of computer chess. The chess computer business needs new young energy, new young talented energy full of ideas willing to experiment. For this we should pay.
But the point of this thread was the new development that some programs might finish ahead of Houdini in the TCEC tournament with Houdini releasing a new version after Stockfish being free and Komodo almost free.
a twisted mess for marketing and sales.
kgburcham

[Tord Romstad]

I remember the days of paying $119.99 for M-Chess Pro,Genius,Gideon Pro like 15 years ago.

Those are an entirely different category of programs than Komodo or Stockfish. M-Chess and Chess Genius were complete chess programs with state of the art (for their time) user interfaces and plenty of features. Komodo and Stockfish are merely UCI engines. They are not useful by themselves, and the average computer user wouldn't even have a clue how to use them. The only good thing about them is that they are really strong, which is not particularly important in a world where computer hardware is so fast that even a mediocre chess engine is more than a match to anyone not in the world elite.

The closest equivalent to M-Chess or Chess Genius today would be something like Deep Fritz 13, which sells for 99 Euros from chessbase.com. A bit less than the price of M-Chess and Chess Genius, especially when considering inflation, but hardly an order of magnitude less.

I would buy them every time a new version came out. The open source programs have certainly been a gold mine for computer chess nuts but it obviously hurts those looking to make some coin off their hard work.

I don't believe that for a moment. No current open source program ships with anything resembling a professional user interface, especially not on desktop computers. It is true that it is harder than it used to be to earn big money from computer chess, but that's because hardware has become so fast that playing strength is no longer a selling point (except in a ridiculously tiny niche market), and because customer expectations for graphical user interfaces are much higher than in the days of MS-DOS, making it difficult for an individual or a small team to create a chess program that is sufficiently elegant and user friendly for the average user.

[Uri Blass]

I disagree that Stockfish or komodo are not useful by themselves because they are clearly useful for analysis.

The fact they are strong is important for people who want to use them for opening preperation or for correspondence games and I believe that the number of these people in the world is at least 10,000 and part of them are even not professional chess players or correspondence chess players.

I lost a game almost a year ago agains some chess player(fide rating below 2100) when he played fast all the first 15 moves and after the game he told me that he already prepared this line 2 months earlier with houdini before the game and memorized that houdini had a score of +6 pawns for white after h4

[pgn]
[Event "Computer chess game"]
[Site "URIBLASS-THINK"]
[Date "2013.02.11"]
[Round "?"]
[White "Kraus, Yair"]
[Black "Blass, Uri"]
[Result "1-0"]
[WhiteElo "2000"]
[BlackElo "2000"]
[PlyCount "39"]
[EventDate "2013.??.??"]
[TimeControl "40/300:40/300:40/300"]

1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 Bb4 4. Qc2 O-O 5. e4 d5 6. e5 Ne4 7. a3 Bxc3+ 8. bxc3
c5 9. Bd3 cxd4 10. cxd4 Qa5+ 11. Kf1 Qc3 $2 12. Bxe4 Qxa1 13. Bxh7+ Kh8
14. Ne2 g6 $2 15. h4 Nc6 16. Qd2 Kxh7 17. Qh6+ Kg8 18.
h5 g5 19. Qxg5+ Kh7 20. Rh3 1-0
[/pgn]

Note that 12.Bxe4 is a good sacrifice that a weak engine may not find and 11...Qc3 and 15...g6 are mistakes that my opponent prepared the right reply against them at home.

[Dr.Wael Deeb]

I remember the days of paying $119.99 for M-Chess Pro,Genius,Gideon Pro like 15 years ago.

Those are an entirely different category of programs than Komodo or Stockfish. M-Chess and Chess Genius were complete chess programs with state of the art (for their time) user interfaces and plenty of features. Komodo and Stockfish are merely UCI engines. They are not useful by themselves, and the average computer user wouldn't even have a clue how to use them. The only good thing about them is that they are really strong, which is not particularly important in a world where computer hardware is so fast that even a mediocre chess engine is more than a match to anyone not in the world elite.

The closest equivalent to M-Chess or Chess Genius today would be something like Deep Fritz 13, which sells for 99 Euros from chessbase.com. A bit less than the price of M-Chess and Chess Genius, especially when considering inflation, but hardly an order of magnitude less.

I would buy them every time a new version came out. The open source programs have certainly been a gold mine for computer chess nuts but it obviously hurts those looking to make some coin off their hard work.

I don't believe that for a moment. No current open source program ships with anything resembling a professional user interface, especially not on desktop computers. It is true that it is harder than it used to be to earn big money from computer chess, but that's because hardware has become so fast that playing strength is no longer a selling point (except in a ridiculously tiny niche market), and because customer expectations for graphical user interfaces are much higher than in the days of MS-DOS, making it difficult for an individual or a small team to create a chess program that is sufficiently elegant and user friendly for the average user.

As Uri wrote earlier,I strongly disagree also....
Dr.D

[carldaman]

It can happen that komodo now get more expensive, instead of houdini cheaper. Special after all the propaganda on TCEC. So, we can have komodo 7 =99$, houdini 4= 95$, and Stockfish free.

... Now I want version of Komodo playing in TCEC and I am waiting for it to be released. I will be more than happy to shell say 100$ being happy the money goes to the authors of this awesomeness.

What awesomeness ?
komodo (dev) had a good tournament and well deserved 1st place, but the current result is statistically insignificant. And is that enough for you to pay 100$?

In order to warrant a much higher price, Komodo should include some important analysis features such as permanent hash and tablebase support.

CL

[Darkmoon]

Stockfish is probably in the top three programs for now and is free, totally free, just download and play.
Komodo may be the strongest program for now and was extremely cheap at $30, almost nothing, a family of four meal at Mcdonalds. I send $80 to Saudia Arabia everytime I fill my Dodge pickup but got Komodo almost for free and I got stockfish for free.

So now how will Houdart price his Houdini 4 when it seems stockfish and komodo are just as strong?
it will seem weird getting Houdini 4 for free or almost free at $30.


I have been buying chess programs for years. A lot of money. They are all on the shelf in cases. I always buy the chessbase version when available in the case, so I always pay top dollar not the cheaper download version. I have bought two versions of Komodo 6 and 3 or 4 versions of Houdini 3.
If Komodo is released in a chessbase version then I will buy it and just put it on the shelf.
So I will buy Houdini 4 in the chessbase version even though it just lost a game with white in Tcec against the free stockfish, and it will probably be 3 times what Komodo cost even though it seems to be equal in strength to Komodo.
I will tell my wife that if I die before her, my chess program collection is worth $0 and to just throw it all in the trash. I assume most programs will start being free or real cheap from now on.
Since programs are going to be free or dirt cheap now, I hope chessbase can stay in business.

Oh well doesn't matter right? The cheap has started.
kgburcham

Haven't you already hammered this topic to death in a recent thread here?

Personally,I was so excited when Kim raised this topic here on our beloved forum and I don't mind getting started all over again

this is an ongoing issue, growing pains for our sport.
my two threads are minor compared to possibilities of the future of computer chess. The chess computer business needs new young energy, new young talented energy full of ideas willing to experiment. For this we should pay.
But the point of this thread was the new development that some programs might finish ahead of Houdini in the TCEC tournament with Houdini releasing a new version after Stockfish being free and Komodo almost free.
a twisted mess for marketing and sales.
kgburcham

For myself it is a matter of finances.

Komodo has proven to be a viable engine. But, to buy every updated release with small incremental improvements just isn't feasible. Not in these tough economic times.

Robert's releases have been impressive. But clearly , that has changed with the competition right on top of him.

However, that doesn't rule out that Houdini 4's evaluation function will not have been enhanced to make it a desirable package if Houdini wins the nTCEC.

It might be a more tougher sell -but I think he will get what he asks for. I noted that he is already selling to those who are on the fringe of the hobby. Those who pay less attention to stats.

[kgburcham]

Stockfish is probably in the top three programs for now and is free, totally free, just download and play.
Komodo may be the strongest program for now and was extremely cheap at $30, almost nothing, a family of four meal at Mcdonalds. I send $80 to Saudia Arabia everytime I fill my Dodge pickup but got Komodo almost for free and I got stockfish for free.

So now how will Houdart price his Houdini 4 when it seems stockfish and komodo are just as strong?
it will seem weird getting Houdini 4 for free or almost free at $30.


I have been buying chess programs for years. A lot of money. They are all on the shelf in cases. I always buy the chessbase version when available in the case, so I always pay top dollar not the cheaper download version. I have bought two versions of Komodo 6 and 3 or 4 versions of Houdini 3.
If Komodo is released in a chessbase version then I will buy it and just put it on the shelf.
So I will buy Houdini 4 in the chessbase version even though it just lost a game with white in Tcec against the free stockfish, and it will probably be 3 times what Komodo cost even though it seems to be equal in strength to Komodo.
I will tell my wife that if I die before her, my chess program collection is worth $0 and to just throw it all in the trash. I assume most programs will start being free or real cheap from now on.
Since programs are going to be free or dirt cheap now, I hope chessbase can stay in business.

Oh well doesn't matter right? The cheap has started.
kgburcham

Haven't you already hammered this topic to death in a recent thread here?

Personally,I was so excited when Kim raised this topic here on our beloved forum and I don't mind getting started all over again

this is an ongoing issue, growing pains for our sport.
my two threads are minor compared to possibilities of the future of computer chess. The chess computer business needs new young energy, new young talented energy full of ideas willing to experiment. For this we should pay.
But the point of this thread was the new development that some programs might finish ahead of Houdini in the TCEC tournament with Houdini releasing a new version after Stockfish being free and Komodo almost free.
a twisted mess for marketing and sales.
kgburcham

For myself it is a matter of finances.

Komodo has proven to be a viable engine. But, to buy every updated release with small incremental improvements just isn't feasible. Not in these tough economic times.

Robert's releases have been impressive. But clearly , that has changed with the competition right on top of him.

However, that doesn't rule out that Houdini 4's evaluation function will not have been enhanced to make it a desirable package if Houdini wins the nTCEC.

It might be a more tougher sell -but I think he will get what he asks for. I noted that he is already selling to those who are on the fringe of the hobby. Those who pay less attention to stats.

Yes Darkmoon, exactly. so will Robert go cheap and sell for same low price as Komodo or does Robert roll the dice and test the market by selling Houdini 4 Pro for $85 or maybe $95. We will know soon.
kgburcham