About style of modern engines

[Kempelen]

Hello,

I myself don't have top engines, so I can not talk about them. My question is simple, and point to people who has been using engines for a lot of years and has a feeling about what computer chess is:

Do you think new top engines tends to play an universal style, or do you think there is room in computer chess to see and enjoy games from different styles? do you think in the future there will be that universal style or will we enjoy of different fights?

regards
Fermín

[jdart]

I think the current dominance of Houdini and the existence of (allegedly) reverse-engineered clones has resulted in many engines that play similarly.

Houdini seems to be very good at evaluating unbalanced positions. For example it will give a neutral evaluation to common positions that involve a pawn sac, such as in the QGA. It also will readily play exchange sacs. That is mostly what I notice about it, besides being generally very strong.

Other programs not from this code base or not otherwise made deliberately similar to its evaluation, can play very differently. Some engines have very high scores for king safety/attack so will play more aggressively when there is a potential attack. Whether this is a good thing or not is questionable though.

I have Fritz 13 also and that not infrequently has scores quite different from Houdini's but I don't think I have enough experience with it to say what the differences are. Junior is also known for evaluating things differently (sometimes wrongly, but sometimes in an interesting way).

--Jon

[Sylwy]

Yes, in top 20 we can talk about an universal style. The kill'em all style (Universal Soldier style) !
To reach the level of Houdini 3 needs near the same Robbo architecture and programming techniques. The number of draws increased and the games are unimpressive complicated.
I have a number of private engines. Yes, here we can talk about a personal style. The authors of private engines are not interested , first of all, in strength but in implement original ideas. Original ideas give a particular playing style.
Do you need really an interesting and spectacular engine ? Here it is:

http://www.fzibi.com/pharaon/zchess200.zip

Not strong like H3 but very spectacular in every game. From it you can learn how to run an attack à la manière de Tal, for example. From H3 you can learn nothing. Why ? The chess at this level it's inhuman. Months and years of work for 10-30-50 ELO points. Serving at what ? Foods for our ego ?

Regards,
SilvianR

[reflectionofpower]

I think the current dominance of Houdini and the existence of (allegedly) reverse-engineered clones has resulted in many engines that play similarly.

Houdini seems to be very good at evaluating unbalanced positions. For example it will give a neutral evaluation to common positions that involve a pawn sac, such as in the QGA. It also will readily play exchange sacs. That is mostly what I notice about it, besides being generally very strong.

Other programs not from this code base or not otherwise made deliberately similar to its evaluation, can play very differently. Some engines have very high scores for king safety/attack so will play more aggressively when there is a potential attack. Whether this is a good thing or not is questionable though.

I have Fritz 13 also and that not infrequently has scores quite different from Houdini's but I don't think I have enough experience with it to say what the differences are. Junior is also known for evaluating things differently (sometimes wrongly, but sometimes in an interesting way).

--Jon

I have to second what Jon said. Back15 years ago or so every engine played different now most play pretty much the same and at the same strength.

[Eraserheads]

Back then we had programs ranging from the ultra aggressive (CSTAL for example) to the ultra solid (Shredder), and a lot of engines in between.

Nowadays, yes any top 20 engine can beat the past greats like they were tinfoil, but stylistically, they have all become similar.

Zchess 2.0 plays like tal? Interesting, I have to try that.

I like watching the games of the Aggressive Engines.

Wchess, Thinker, Glaurung 1.2.1, Junior 7, Gambit Tiger 2 Aggressive, CSTal, Fritz 10. I'll be glad to see Zchess make it to this list!

[lech]

...
From H3 you can learn nothing. Why ? The chess at this level it's inhuman. Months and years of work for 10-30-50 ELO points. Serving at what ? Foods for our ego ?

The same Earth, but your world seems to be impossible to touch by anyone If you can think in this subtle way, what do you want to find here.

[Dr.Wael Deeb]

Back then we had programs ranging from the ultra aggressive (CSTAL for example) to the ultra solid (Shredder), and a lot of engines in between.

Nowadays, yes any top 20 engine can beat the past greats like they were tinfoil, but stylistically, they have all become similar.

Zchess 2.0 plays like tal? Interesting, I have to try that.

I like watching the games of the Aggressive Engines.

Wchess, Thinker, Glaurung 1.2.1, Junior 7, Gambit Tiger 2 Aggressive, CSTal, Fritz 10. I'll be glad to see Zchess make it to this list!

Excellent point of view.....

[tomgdrums]

Back then we had programs ranging from the ultra aggressive (CSTAL for example) to the ultra solid (Shredder), and a lot of engines in between.

Nowadays, yes any top 20 engine can beat the past greats like they were tinfoil, but stylistically, they have all become similar.

Zchess 2.0 plays like tal? Interesting, I have to try that.

I like watching the games of the Aggressive Engines.

Wchess, Thinker, Glaurung 1.2.1, Junior 7, Gambit Tiger 2 Aggressive, CSTal, Fritz 10. I'll be glad to see Zchess make it to this list!

Excellent point of view.....

As the engines get more and more alike I find myself less compelled to have many of them.

When it comes to post game analysis of my own games or master games I am pretty much down to using Houdini 3, Komodo 4(still love THAT engine) and Junior 13. Sometimes Fritz 13. But that is it and usually even then there is not much derivation of move choice. Quite a bit in evaluation.

Now for playing against an engine? My absolute THREE favorites are Hiarcs 14, Shredder for Ipad and MY favorite... Chess Tiger for Ipad. The Chess Tiger for Ipad is SUPER fun to play against and is a beautiful looking app and even has some great training features. (kind of wish Theron would make it for PC!!)

Chess Tiger for Ipad still keeps some of the romance in Chess.

[Eraserheads]

"From H3 you can learn nothing. Why ? The chess at this level it's inhuman. Months and years of work for 10-30-50 ELO points. Serving at what ? Foods for our ego ?"

Somehow there is truth in this. I learned a lot from Gambit Tiger 2's games and Tiger 13's games..but watching Houdini or the latest strongest engines - it has become cryptic for me to understand what's going on in most games.