Takodori's Entrance to Shogi World

"Shion no ou" will become a game on DS next spring

According to latest Shukan Shogi(Weekly shogi magazine in Japanese), "Shion no Ou" will be released as a game on DS by Mainichi Communications Inc. in the coming spring. The details of the product will be unveiled next year. But I don't think it has an English version since I have not heard the anime will be licensed outside Japan yet. But anyway, it's somewhat interesting to know a shogi anime will generate a DS package as an example of media mix in shogi.

Episode 10 of Three-piece Story was released.

You can read not only Episode 10 but also the former ones through the page linked below;

Three-Piece Story | Tokyo Tales | Trends in Japan | Web Japan

Habu made the quickest achievement of 1000 victories

Yesterday Habu beat Kubo in a game of 66th Juni-sen. With this victory, he achieved 1000 wins since he became a professional player. He is the quickest, youngest player with the highest winning percentage at the time of getting to the great record comparing with the other 7 players who already achieved 1000 victories. According to Mainichi, he achieved it in 22 years at the age of 37 with the winning percentage of .728(1000 wins, 373 losses and 1 jishogi). Tanigawa is the second quickest player who achieved it in 25 years and 6 months at the age of 40. Oyama has the second highest winning percentage of .687 at the time of getting to it.

Congratulation on Habu.

Photos of Kasparov's playing shogi at chessbase.com

Photos and an article that chess champion Gary Kasparov played shogi has been published at chessbase.com. Here is the link(The article is in German).

Kasparov als Shogi-Spieler

Here is the like to the page translated into English by Google.

Kasparov as shogi player

 

Habu's winning 1000 games is at stake

Habu's next game is scheduled on December 20 with Toshiaki Kubo. He already won 999 games before it. If he wins the game, his rate of achieving 1000 victories are the quickest in shogi history. According to the blog called Reiro in Japanese, there are 7 professional players who achieved 1000 victories such as Yasuharu Oyama, Hifumi Kato, Makoto Nakahara, Kunio Yonenaga, Kunio Naito, Michio Ariyoshi and Koji Tanigawa.

The quickest achievement is made by Tanigawa - 25 years and 6 month.
The highest winning percentage at the achievement of 1000 victories is made by Oyama - 68.7%

If Habu win the next game, he will get to the great number in 21 years and 11 months with the winning percentage of 72.8%. Whether this or next year, the new records will be certainly generated.

"81 diver" is one of Jury Recommended Works in 11th Japan Media Arts Festival

81 diver is a manga which illustrates shogi players for gambling. It's swinging this year in Japan and is selected one of the Jury Recommended Works of Manga Division/Sotry Manga in 11th Japan Media Arts Festival.

A reviewer of "Shion no ou" played Hamshogi and found shogi hard.

I would like to introduce a blog which specializes in reviewing Anime programms and it mentions to each Episode of Shion no Ou below;

Star Crossed Anime Blog :: Shion no Ou

In the review of the Episode 8, the reviewer wrote he tried Hamshogi and found shogi is a harder game than it looked. Interesting!

Hamshogi is a webtop human-to-machine type computer shogi software which you do not need to download to play. I posted how to use Hamshogi in English to shogi-l this June. If you need it for the use of Hamushogi linked above, here is the link to my post.

Three-Piece Story by Takeuchi Makoto

I found the following weekly short novel was started from this October. Enjoy yourself.

Three Piece Story | Tokyo Tales

This is a story about mystery solving and cultural cross-pollination, as played out on a chessboard—or a shogi board or a xiangqi board. Three people, one from China, one from the United States, and one from Japan, come together in the borderless realm of the Internet and discover a common affinity as each, despite occasional clashes, takes an interest in the others’ worlds.

It has 5 episodes up to now.

Here is the author's website called "TAKEUCHI Makoto's Website English contents".

A movie of Cosplay Shogi at Youmacon 2007

Today I happened to find a movie of Cosplay Shougi held at Youmacon 2007 in Detroit, US. The link is below. The length of it is 7 minutes and 24 seconds. Enjoy!

YoumaCon 07 Cosplay Shougi HighLights

Blog entries by a guy who finally purchased The Art of Shogi

I would like readers to share the entries by a guy in Malaysia who waited for a long time but finally purchased a copy of The Art of Shogi written by Tony Hosking.

A lousy week (September 30)

That's right, I love to play shogi but unfortunately I'm still a beginner. I've made an order for a book last month unfortunately the company cancel the order due to item lost. *Sigh* I guess I have to wait another month for my new purchase of "The Art of Shogi" to arrive.

Exams, Work, Shogi and Wei? kreuz!!! (November 16)

I'm happy to say that I just receive a copy of a shogi strategy book called "Art of Shogi" last Monday and man oh man I'm so FREAKING HAPPY! I was actually spending the whole night learning until 5am!

I quickly understand how happy he is now. I believe the book will improve his shogi extensively as he is absorbed in reading it whole night.