Introduction

Hello, I used to have a blog of my other hobby back in the day and I always felt it was a good way for some bonus motivation so now I decided to start writing a new one about my new obsession; Chess & Go.

Here I'm going to introduce myself, get you on the track with me and my path to this point. I plan to do a thorough comparison of the two games from a novice point of view (mine) soon. After that, I'll keep posting things I find interesting; discoveries, exciting news, my personal news & progress etc.

They are both abstract strategy/war games, although they are quite different in rules and play, the mindset and audience I feel are pretty much the same. Chess is pretty popular in the West and most of us know the game, maybe know the rules and have played the game. You could say the same goes for Go in the East-Asia, mainly Japan, China, Korea and Taiwan.

Through my youth I enjoyed playing challenging console & pc games. Games where you got rewards for putting in effort, so mostly RPGs and skill-bassed shooters and strategy games. I played some occasional chess games as a kid but had no idea how to get better at it. The aura surrounding both of these mind games (games for the intelligent) led me to believe that I was simply too stupid to get better at them. It build my respect for the game, but kept me from playing, so I'm not sure if it's a good ad for the game. Because the truth is, anyone can get better at these games. You don't have to be a brainiac, although it certainly helps somewhat. More so you need to have some willpower to commit to learning and studying and have a burn for getting better, which is something so called "intelligent" people often do.

We could go deep and long in my thoughts of intelligence and so called talent, for I feel like I was led to believe as a child and a young one that I didn't have enough of either to actually show great results in those fields due to the general beliefs attached to them. As a result, it took me 23 years to break these shackles and realize that I could be good at chess, I could go to university etc. even though I was raised to be a working class son.

It all comes down to effort we make, and while some people get things easier, that "talent" may even be a hinder in the long run when they dwell beyond their comfort zone, while we average people who do challenge ourselves, don't get scared in the face of a challenge. Maybe I'll open up this more another time.

Bottom line is, have faith. If you are doing something you are "not good at", it may be very hard at first because your brain isn't readily wired for that thing, but you _will_ get better if you keep at it and you will definately see results in the long run, which will help you in the future with anything even remotely connected to what you did before. Don't expect too much, but not too little either.


Back to me; How we got here
I started out Go last year, November of 2013 to be exact. I heard first time from the game in an internet forum where they discussed the unique human touch required for the game, that computers couldn't quite well reproduce. I had thought about picking up one good skill-based game like DoTA2 for my pc, but I found it more intriguing to be able to play such a deep and skillful game on an actual board face-to-face with real people, and decided to try and later commit to pursuit higher level of play.

Learning Go is actually very pleasant because you can easily see your progress from your rank graph which is so accurate it's hard to believe. Every month you'd learn so much new that the you from month before wouldn't have any chance to win you in an even game if you played 10 games straight. (which is called a jubango, by the way) Go has this clever handicap system that is based on the ranks and so little luck involved that the system is quite perfect. Although your playing strength may fluctuate with your feelings, tired, tipsy from a few beers etc., there is very little room for lucky wins. It just the way the game works, there's not a lot of tricks, it's just strength and cleverness. Every rank you get more stable and wise about your moves. For this reason the handicap system exists so that 2 people of different levels can play a meaningful game together. It also means that in every ranked game you play, you will have to give your 100% or you will lose, if there's no outside factors in play.

So I studied, play'd and got better in Go for 6 months. The last serious days of my Go were back in May, when I attented my first tournament. It happened to be a coincidence that the tournament was organized in a chess arena. I didn't have a very pleasurable tournament experience after losing all my games and failing to socialize with the players despite effort in both.

 I spent the breaks looking at all the chess gear in the arena and suddenly realized, that if I had got better at Go relatively easy and in a short time (I was 14 kyu at the time, which is one step over beginner ranks) I really could probably do the same with Chess. It was something I occcasionally had thought of throughout my life, but had been too scared to try - or to know how for that matter. I resisted for a while, but time and again found myself playing chess.

A bit later I decided to give Chess a good go. Obviously, there can only be one at a time so I haven't been studying Go for now. I decided I'd try my best for about the same time as I had spent with Go and then finally make my decision to choose one game over the other for a lifelong hobby, I hope.

And here I am, one month later. So far I've read two chess books, played about a hundred meaningful games and doing tactics training and miscellaneous stuff. I try to spend anywhere from 1-3 hours a day on an average to play and get better. Learning Chess however, hasn't been quite so enjoyable and straightforward. The ranking system is too unstable to be an indicator at this point, and while I think I'm playing better day by day, there's no proof of that.

But unlike Go, I found playing chess more.. fun, I guess is the word. There's nothing quite so exciting in the world of games as delivering a check mate, or finding a tactic that will capture your valuable enemy piece without losses. Also since the handicap system is broken in Chess, I have no fear of playing (and losing) while feeling a bit down for whatever reason, so it's more enjoyable to me. I can even down a few beers on a weekend night and play well enough to enjoy the game, unlike in Go where just one beer for me would break the game for me. (probably, since most of the games in Go are so tight to begin with) Also, I don't get so emotional about losing in Chess either. There are some ups and downs for both of the games, I'll go into detail later.

That said, I respect and perhaps miss a bit the brilliance and magnificence of Go. Chess is the best game made by men, but Go is so fine it must've been made by gods, I quote freely. Unless you seriously played both you have no opinion here, since after you sink into either of the games, you will find amazing things that you possibly can't expect to exist anywhere else. Well, I must say there are 2 games over all the others in this planet.

Right now, it's chess for me, please! :)
If you got this far in my essay, I salute you. Introductions can be long at times.
May the pieces work for you, until next time!