Takodori's Entrance to Shogi World

Shogi to be showcased in Irish Go Association on October 29

According to the blog of Irish Go Association, Shogi will be showcased along with Igo variants and other games on October 29 after their annual general meeting.

Irish Go Association » Blog Archive » Annual General meeting

After the AGM finishes there will be a demonstration night to showcase Go Variants and other related Games. So far Joker Go, Abalone, Go Moku, Nine Men’s Morris, Shogi, Hive, Clobber and Amazons have been mentioned. Playing Go will be allowed too.

There are many professional Go players who likes shogi in Japan. According to the Wikipedia pages in Japanese, Cho-chikun often playes on-line shogi, Kudo Norio has ama-5-dan and they say Takagi Shoichi would be A class player unless he became a professional Go player. One of my friends told me today that the recent edition of Shukan Go(Weekly Go) magazine reported that a shogi club was formed again in Nihon Kiin. He informed me that the members on the report is Kubo Hideo, Miyazawa Goro and Abe Yoshiteru.

Also, there are many professional Shogi players who likes Go. The greatest players such as Oyama Yasuharu and Masuda Kozo liked to play Go. Yonenaga Kunio wrote a book of Go. Manabe Kazuo, Kawaguchi Toshiko, Tosa Koji, Senzaki Manabu, Goda Masataka, and many more.

Blog titled "superhero shogi"

I think many of the readers of this blog might be interested in the contents of superhero shogi. Here is the link to each entry so far today.

superhero shogi: Basic guide to Kifu for Windows

superhero shogi: how to replay your shogi games as shockwave flash animations on internet explorer

superhero shogi: how to replay, save and convert shogi gamescores from internet games

superhero shogi: Lots of free shogi software from the Land of the Rising Sun

superhero shogi: playing shogi on your pocket pc

Blogs written by some participants of JET programme

Do you know JET programme? I did not know it until recently. Here is the information.

The JET Programme--Official Homepage of The Japan Exchange and Teaching Programme

The Japan Exchange and Teaching (JET) Programme, now in its 21st year, is aimed at promoting grass-roots international exchange between Japan and other nations. The number of countries sending participants has risen over the years, as has the number of participants. In 2007, the Programme has welcomed 5,119 participants from 41 countries.

It seems like lots of non-Japanese people has come and are coming to every 47 prefectures in Japan. Yesterday, I found two blog entries about the culture event including shogi for JET participants in Aomori City. Here are the links.

Crunky Japan! - I am being paid to have fun!

"My second workshop was on the rules of shogi. It was fairly interesting but DIFFICULT. It is a game of strategy, much like western chess. It was hard to remember all ways you can move each piece and I have the sinking feeling that I would not even be aware when I actually had a tsumi and could win (tsumi is like checkmate). Learned about the pro league of shogi and how much money they are raking in. There can be only one dragon king (the ultimate winner) at a time and he makes around 500,000 dollars for winning. The dragon king sounds too much like the grand dragon of the KKK for me. "

Culture Day, Part 1 « Pacificloons

"After lunch I attended sessions on shogi (Japanese chess), taiko (traditional drumming), and karate. Taiko was my favorite of the three. I hope to have a longer post dedicated to it in the near future that will involve a popular arcade game. Shogi was interesting, but I still prefer Go. I spent most of my time in the karate session reminiscing about my two years in taekwondo when I was in elementary school."

I think it is good to use shogi to be used to promote grass-roots international exchange between Japan and other nations.

Boardlive now - Nakagawa vs Sugimoto, Asahi Trophy Shogi Open

Today is the day for the game of 2nd Asahi Trophy Shogi Open between Nakagawa Daisuke(7 dan) and Sugimoto Masataka(7 dan). As a result of Furigoma, Nakagawa became a Sente player. You may watch or replay the game through either of the virtual boards linked below;

Kifu for Flash | Kifu for Java

The venue of this match is Tokyo Shogi Kaikan of NSR. The thinking time per player is 40 minutes and 60 seconds per move after consuming it. So I think it will end within 2 hours from now.

Boardlive today - 1st game of 19th Joryu Oui-sen

Today is the day for the 1st game of 19th Joryu Oui-sen. The title is being competed in a three-win match. Ishibashi Sachio Shimizu Ichiyo challenges Joryu Oui Shimizu Ichiyo Ishibashi Sachio at Egre Himeji(in Japanese) in Hyogo prefecture. As a result of Furigoma, Ishibashi became Sente player. You may watch or replay the game through the virtual board linked below.

1st game of 19th Joryu Oui-sen (Javascript used)

Photo of Ishibashi | Photo of Shimizu(These are to be updated frequently)

The game started at 9:00am in Japan. The thinking time per player is 4 hours and less than 60 seconds per move after consuming it. I think it will end between 5:00 and 7:00pm.

Here is the link to the toppage of the 1st game. The left photo is Challenger Ishibashi and the right is Joryu Oui Shimizu.

http://www.kobe-np.co.jp/19joryu/

Yu-Gi-Oh's creator, Takahashi Kazuki, enjoys shogi

Recently I read a blog which informs that Takahashi Kazuki, Yu-Gi-Oh's creator, enjoys shogi. And I found the reliable source information on the Net as below;

SHONEN JUMP

"A lifelong gamer, Takahashi enjoys Shogi (Japanese chess), Mahjong, card games, and tabletop RPGs, among other games."

There is information that it became clear in the interview with him published in the February 2003 edition of Shonen Jump(USA version).

Virtual and real pieces with indication of how to move

An Shotest Shogi user commented about the necessity of real shogi pieces with indication of how to move.

Shogi on the XBox 360! | Shogi | BoardGameGeek

I wish I could find a real board and pieces like the ones they use for this. One look at the piece and you know how it moves. Makes it lots more fun to play when I know what each piece is.

Here is the link to an image of pieces with indication of how to move. One character such as K, R, B or so represents what the piece is and the move is indicated by using arrows.

Xbox.com | Media Viewer - Shotest Shogi ScreenShot

In Japan, Kumon sells shogi pieces with the indication of how to move together with a board. The big difference comparing with the pieces of Shotest is that one Kanji character is used to represents what the piece is. The idea of using arronws on each piece is very similar, though. The page below includes some images of pieces Kumon sells.

【楽天市場】NEWスタディ将棋：日本将棋連盟

Update - The page of "Tsume problems to improve your endgame skill"

Today I added the following link to the page of Tsume problems to improve your endgame skill

Easy Tsumeshogi Problem for Beginners

This is the problems of one-move and three-move tsume problems. I will publish new ones there frequently. So please check it out from time to time.

 

Raw lines - Chidori'Gin no Senpo Zukan -11, Yagura strategy, Battle[1]

 This is the raw lines of Kifu used in the diagrams in the following pages of Chidori Gin no Senpo Zukan which is an on-line Encycropedia of shogi opening strategies. The linked page has Kifu-for-Java diagrams which needs a Kifu-for-Java capable browser to replay there.

【戦法図鑑】11　矢倉戦法　戦闘編［１］-11, Yagura strategy, Battle[1]

 

From Starting set-up to Diagram #1 & #2

<From start to Dia#2>   1.P-7f   P-8d     2.S-6h   P-3d     3.P-6f   S-6b     4.P-5f   P-5d      5.S-4h   S-4b     6.G-7h   G-3b     7.G-5h   K-4a     8.G5h-6g G-5b      9.K-6i   P-7d    10.S-7g   S-3c    11.P-3f   P-4d    12.B-7i   B-3a    13.S-3g   G5b-4c  14.P-3e   Px3e    15.Bx3e   P*3d    16.B-2f   B-4b    17.S-3f   K-3a    18.K-7i   K-2b    19.K-8h   P-6d    20.P-4f   S-6c    21.N-3g   R-7b    22.P-1f   P-9d    23.P-9f   P-1d    24.R-4h   P-7e    25.Px7e   Rx7e    26.P*7f   R-7b    27.P-4e   Px4e    28.P*4d   Sx4d    29.Sx4e   Sx4e    30.P*4d   G-5c    31.Nx4e   G-5b    32.S*6a   R-8b    33.Sx5b+  Sx5b    34.P-4c+  Gx4c    35.N-5c+               

It's recommendable to replay the line using your own shogi board and pieces. If you do not have them, the following pages might be of help;

• Papercraft shogi, Print & Play shogi

• Aja-ban

Results of PlayOK(former Kurnik) Official Shogi tournaments held last September

PlayOK(former Kurnik) is an on-line gamesite where you can play shogi in various time control. Here is the list of the captioned tournaments held there last month. First column is the tournament number, Second is the date. The third is the winner. You can go to the page of the tournament table by clicking each link of tournament number.

• 2509711     2008-09-27 (sat.) 14:15   (cancelled)
  2509685     2008-09-24 (wed.) 20:15  (cancelled)
  2491083     2008-09-20 (sat.) 14:15   linkuei
  2491057     2008-09-17 (wed.) 20:15  linwood408
  2472621     2008-09-13 (sat.) 14:15   linkuei
  2472595     2008-09-10 (wed.) 20:15  gluzd
  2453159     2008-09-06 (sat.) 14:15   mugen9x9
  2453133     2008-09-03 (wed.) 20:15  wwwshogipl

PlayOK shogi official tournaments take place every Wednesday and Saturday. The more detailed schedule of the coming tournaments can be found in the page of upcoming tournaments.