About the article titled "In the squares, not on the intersections, goddammit!"

It is an interesting article. But there is one point I don't think it's true.

In the squares, not on the intersections, goddammit!

Even in Japan, shogi plays second fiddle to Go.

In Japan, no Go professional player exist who is more famous than Shogi professional player Habu Yoshiharu.

According to Leisure White Paper published every year,  the population of  Go in Japan has never exceeded and tied with that of  Shogi  since it was published. Shogi population is larger in Japan.

In manga  world,  Go has only one major title - Hikaru no Go. On the contrary, shogi has more such as Gekka no Kishi, Shion no ou, 81 Diver, 3 gatsu no Lion and so forth.

I don't see any reason why it is true that shogi plays second fiddle to Go in Japan.

Comments

[Ryou Takehito]

"Who knows, though? Soon there could be a boom in popularity. Shion no Oh is an anime with shogi as a central theme. Hell, it worked for Go, right?! Of course, Go never seemed to have an inferiority complex (or a board) quite this stupidly huge"

From my small research, Shion no Oh won't be inspiring too many people to play Shogi, unlike Hikaru no Go, mainly because the anime doesn't explain the basics of the game. Only curious people will like to try their hands on Shogi.

And the author didn't know that there are a lot of variation of Shogi and Tai Shogi ban is way larger than Go.