Having soundly defeated the best players on the world stage, new world chess champion Bobby Fischer found himself disillusioned. He decried chess (at the highest levels) as being dominated by “pre-arrangement and memorization” rather than creativity and talent. From then on he endorsed only one game:
Random Chess
He designed his own version (Fischer Random a.k.a. Chess960) specifically to render memorized openings obsolete. Or, as he put it, to “level the playing field.”
His goal was to return “spontaneous talent and creativity” to the chess world — guaranteeing a dynamic, spirited battle of wits and courage.
Sound exciting?
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“You have to have the fighting spirit. You have to force moves and take chances.” ~ Bobby Fischer
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(We couldn’t agree more.)
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But Fischer knew it was unwise to leave everything to chance — he feared the “anarchy” of a fully randomized game.
And for good reason . . .
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