According to the ratings page of provisional BKR players in Brainking.com, the number of shogi players who has provisional BKR decreased to 147 at the end of December(JST). The site has added shogi to its wide variety of game line since August 12, 2005(JST). Comparing with the end of November, 2006, the number of shogi players decreased by 11. Please refer to the definition of BKR(BrainKing Rating) if you like to know.
The details by country are as followings; .
USA --- 29(0) Czech --- 14(-4) France --- 10(+2) Netherland --- 7(-3) England --- 7(0) Italy --- 6(0) Slovakia --- 6(0) Australia --- 5(+2) Sweden --- 4(0) Japan --- 4(+1) Switzerland --- 4(+1) UK --- 4(0) Germany --- 3(-3) Russia --- 3(-2) Belgium --- 3(0) Portugal --- 3(0) Spain --- 3(0) Canada --- 2(0) Norway --- 2(0) Argentina --- 1(0) Basque --- 1(+1) Denmark --- 1(0) Dominica --- 1(+1) Estonia --- 1(0) Finland --- 1(0) Hong Kong --- 1(0) Korea --- 1(0) Latvia --- 1(0) Luxembourg --- 1(0) Malaysia --- 1(0) New Zealand --- 1(0) Saint Lucia --- 0(-1) Slovenia --- 1(0) Thailand --- 1(0) Turkey --- 1(+1) Ukraine --- 1(0) Unspecified ---12 (-2) Austria --- 0(-3) Guatemala --- 0 (-1) Israel --- 0(-1)
There are lots of great movies with chess scenes inside the strory such as Casablanca, the Great Escape, From Russia with Love, Searching for bobby Fischer and so on. There are lots of Japanese made movies with shogi scenes as well but not many are avaialble to watch in the countries outside Japan. Today I would like to introduce a Japanese film with shogi scene which is sold in Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk. It's directed by Hirokazu Koreeda. The title is "Afterlife". I laughed very much when I encountered the shogi scene of it recently.
For your reference, here are some review pages of this film.
On December 20 and 21, the 7th and final game of 19th Ryuoh title match was held in Niigata prefecture, Japan. As a result of Furigoma, Watanabe became Sente(the first mover). He won it in 149 moves. By this victory, Watanabe defended the title of Ryuoh by the score of 4-3 following to the 18th term last year and he has held it for three terms in a row. No one expect Fujii 9dan had held the title for such terms before. Congratulation on Watanabe's great achievement! He earned 32 million yen as prize money and 14.5million yen as Taikyokuryo.
You may replay the game here.(using Kifu for Java V.2.23. Java-capable browser required). The usage of pawn presented by Watanabe in this game was very tactful and must-see. And decisive bishop drop on 5g as the 125th move and trading it for a Pawn a few moves later were brilliant. If you would like to read the reports about Ryuoh-sen in Japanese or to watch photos of it, Ryuoh-sen blog is for you. It has archives by day.
The diagram above is the resignation diagram where Watanabe made the 149th move of G4b-3a. Sato resigned at that time. At the diagram, Gote(White, Upper side)'s King is hopeless. Here are some examples of possible variation after it. You will understand what a good pawn drop on 3f as the 119th move was by getting through them.
G*2b Gx2a Kx2a Rx2b+ Kx2b R*4b N*3b N*3d Gx3d P*2c Kx2c Sx3d Kx3d G*3e K-2c R-4c+ G*3c G-3d K-1b G*2b Kx2b Gx3c K-2a +Rx3b(mate, replayable in the diagram by clicking the arow toward the right direction)
In any case, Gote's King would be trapped.
Here are the important variation at the 123th move and 125th move. Both diagrams are Gote's turn and Gote could attack by sacrificing kNight by N*7e to be followed by the moves like Px7e S*7f. The following replayable diagrams show what would happen if Gote did so. As you can see, Gote's King would be trapped in both cases. Sometimes the exclamation mark appears under the diagrams when you replay the variations. You can read my comments by clicking the mark.(A small window containing my comment appears). Another click of the exclamation mark bring the small window away.
I'm afraid I wrote a wrong information about the Taikyokuryo of Ryuoh-sen in the entry of 12/15. Please be advised that I corrected the entry. I apologize any inconvenience caused.
The 7th and final game of the 19th Ryuoh-sen started. This is the biggest shogi game of this year. The winner of this game will be the next Ryuoh title holder and earn 32 million yen as prize money. The game will end around the evening on December 21(Japan time). You may watch and replay the game on the virtual board. The further information of doing so can be found here in shogi-l archives.
On December 13 & 14, the 6th game of 19th Ryuoh-sen between Ryuoh Watanabe and Challenger Kisei Sato was held in Yamagata prefecture, Japan. Before the game, Watanabe led the score by 3-2. Since Ryuoh-sen is a 4-wins-match, Sato must not lose the game to take the title. Sato tied the score by 3-3 winning this game in 114 moves. This is the link to the photo just after the game was over(Upper-Sato, Lower-Watanabe). You can replay the game on the virtual board here with comments in Japanese.(Java-capable browser is required.)
Watanabe was a Sente player(made the first move). Sato played G-3b as the second move without opening his Bishop diagonal line yet. Watanabe responded it by transferring his Rook to the central file while he does not usually take Furibisha(Ranging Rook) opening. Then both Kings were moved to the edge to build Anaguma Gakoi(castle). In the middlegame, Sato's right kNight got promoted in the center of the board while Watanabe's kNight stayed in the original position. And Watabane's right Silver was forced to be idled by Sato's tactful pawn sacrifice. I think it was Sato's satisfactory game.
The diagram below is one when Watanabe resigned the game at the 114th move of Rx2i+. Sente(Black, Lower side)'s King would be mated after the diagram.
Here is the possible mating variation after the resignation diagram.
Gx2i +Rx2i Kx2i Bx3h+ Kx3h Nx4f K-4h G*4g(!) Kx4g B*6i K-4h B-5h+ K-3i G*3h(mate, this line is replayable by clicking the arrow in the right direction under the diagram).
In any case, Sente's King would be forced to be mated. The final seventh game will be held on December 20 & 21 in Niigata prefecture. It will be a financially big game as well. The winner will obtain 32 million yen as the prize money(The loser will obtain 8 million yen, so the difference will be 24 million yen. For your recerence, "Taikyokuryo" exists apart from the prize money, It's the money to be paid to the players without depending on the victory/defeat, is 14.5 million yen for Ryuoh and 7 million yen for Challenger per game in Ryuoh-sen. Yes, the title holder already got 87 million yen and Challenger did 42 million yen as Taikyokuryo since they already finished six games). It's the money to be paid for the players without depending on the victory/defeat and the number of the games. The Taikyokuryo of the defender is 14.5 million yen while that of the challenger is 7 million yen. If the title is defended, the defender will get 46.5 million yen in total.(This part was corrected on December 22).
There are lot of Tsume problem sites in Japanese. Almost all the professional players say solving a lot of tsume problems is a good way to improve your shogi strength. I am giving you one story about 3 crown Habu. He showed up in a TV interview this year. The female interviewer asked him to show the inside of his bag. He disclosed it and there was the latest magazine of Tsume Shogi Paradise which specialized in Tsumeshogi. Even top players usually brings tsumeshogi problems with him to solve Tsumeshogi at any vacant time to keep or improve their skill in the endgame. Why don't you give it a try to solve tsume problems frequently?
I'm inserting here the tsume practices I published in this blog. It's easier than most of the problems which are available on Internet(Added on February 2, 2008).
Take & Drop - 3 move tsume practice - There are forty problems. You will unconciously learn that you may drop a piece effectively soon after you take it through solving them. Repeating to solve them until you solves all of them without fail is recommended. (Added on February 2 2008).
Atamakin Tsume Practice - There are twenty-four problems. "Atamakin" is a basic mating shape of dropping a Gold in front of the opponent's King. You can learn how to mate using the tactical Atamakin move through solving these problems repeatedly.(Added on April 17 2008)
Here is my recommendation of Tsume websites. Although they are written in Japanese, I think it will be no problem to recognize and think about the problems. All the pages are recommended to see with your browser set Japanese as encode setting.
1 move tsume problems at shogitown.com - It's very basic and suitable for beginners. Go to the page and the click the latter half of the twelve links in a horizontal line in the middle of the page first, as the author recommends to do so since the latter half of the links are easier to solve. Each link contains 4 to 5 one move tsume problems. You can see the answer page by clicking the link under the problem diagram at the bottom of the problem page.
3 move tsume problems at shogitown.com - It's also suitable for beginners. If you see the 1 move tsume problems above a bit easy, then this link is for you. Go to the linked page and click any of the links. Then you can find some 3 move tsume problem diagrams there. Clicking the link at the bottom of each page of the problem diagrams will bring you the answer page.
5 move tsume problems at shogitown.com - It's also suitable for beginners. If you come to feel the 3 move tsume problems above a bit easy, then this link is for you. Go to the linked page and click any of the links. Then you can find some 5 move tsume problem diagrams there. Clicking the link at the bottom of each page of the problem diagrams will bring you the answer page.
森信雄の日々入門詰将棋(Mori Nobuo no Hibi Nyumon Tsumeshogi) - The author is professional 6 dan, Nobuo Mori. I think it's for intermediates although the author says it is beginner/entry level problems. He uploads a few new problems almost daily.
実践の１手詰（全100問）(100 one move tsume problems extracted from real games at shogizanmai.com) - It is for beginners. I think it's good for the beginners to graduate 3 move tsume problems at shogitown shown above. Java-capable browser is required to see the pages. The problem diagrams are created in 詰将棋盤(in Japanese). The replayable answer diagrams are created in ES将棋（in Japanese site). Click the links of 解答例 under the problem diagram in each page to go to the answer page.
実践の３手詰め（全１００問）(100 three move tsume problems extracted from real games at shogizanmai.com) - It is for beginners/intermediates. Java-capable browser is required to see the pages. The page operation is the same as above.
(Unfortunately, I found that Shogizanmai.com which had lots of good tsume problems is missing. So the links below are no longer valid. (April 17 2008).
The 6th game of the 19th Ryuoh-sen started. You may watch and replay the game on the virtual board. The further information of doing so can be found here in shogi-l archives.
I recently found that the Shogi category exists in Wikimedia Commons which is a database of more than one million media files to which registered users can contribute. Anyone can create your account through this page.
Shogi category has 73 media files related to shogi now which includes the photo of Kansai Shogi Kaikan(Branch of Nihon Shogi Renmei in Osaka prefecture), diagrams of initial set-up of various shogi variants, photos of real shogi tiles, diagrams of various Kakoi(castle) and so on.
There is no movie/animation files there yet. But I think those kind of files will be uploaded into the category sooner or later in the future.
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