Game Review: Master Chess (Commodore 16 and Plus/4, Mastertronic)

Master Chess, according to Mastertronic, has been designed to be a no-frills chess playing program of advanced ability which is easy to use.  This version, needing to fit into 16K, will also have some features missing, which we will come to during this review.  The instructions are comprehensive, and as well as giving you all the keys you need, effectively allows you to either re-arrange the pieces to a position of your advantage to work from, or start from a blank board and add the pieces as you need.  In theory this means you could recreate a puzzle from a newspaper or magazine and play against the computer opponent.    There are also two different loaders used for this game – the standard Novaload, and an alternate turbo with green stripes.  Both are the same in-game, but worth noting for completists nonetheless.

Knights of Cydonia

When the game initially loads, the board is in black and white with the chess pieces clearly defined on those squares, with a yellow right-hand side and black text for the moves, which is better than the awful colour scheme of the Commodore 64 version.  If you have the alternate turbo border, the outside border is green – this is blue on the Novaload version, and with a flashing cursor in the top left – which really should not be there and looks like a bug in the code.  You are asked to select black or white, and then the amount of thinking time (in seconds) that the computer opponent is allowed for each move. The two-player mode is once again sadly missing here, so you cannot play with an equally skilled opponent.  This is a real let down even before you start the game.  If you select black, the board is rotated 180 degrees so that your starting pieces are always at the bottom of the board no matter which colour you choose.

Killer Queen

Exactly like the Commodore 64 version, whoever is white starts the game first, and the grid is laid out with letters A to H along the bottom, and 1 to 8 along the left-hand side vertically if white (this reversed if black, so H to A and 8 to 1), meaning that to enter a move you need to give the grid position of the starting square where your piece is via the keyboard, and then the grid position where you wish the piece to go.  So, for example moving a pawn from D2 to D4 would be an initial valid move.  The moves are checked and validated, and if incorrect you will be told and asked to enter the grid positions again.    However, one feature is missing – you cannot press space to see what pieces have been taken during play, and this was presumably done to fit the game into memory.

Only a Pawn in Their Game

You can also press RETURN when it is your move for the options screen.  Here you can return to the game, change the thinking time for the computer opponent, as well as re-arrange the board (or set up as a blank board), placing the pieces on the board to your hearts content.  This works the same as the Commodore 64 version, in that you select the square you wish to amend, and either use the W or B keys along with its piece name to place it there, so WP puts a white pawn on the square, BN adds a black knight – and the shorthand is again detailed in the instructions.  There is no action replay option in this version – this had to be removed to ensure that the game could fit into memory.  You can also load or save a game – however it is always the same file, so one game per blank cassette, and start a new game should you wish to do so.

Keeping In Check

As you play the moves, they are all recorded on the right-hand side of the board and has notational shorthand, so E3xE6 might be a move from a rook (or castle) and taking another piece, moving from E3 to E6.  You can press RETURN to force a best move at that point for the computer, although you may wish to amend the time given instead.  One thing that is notable – if you do go in check, and then escape out of check, the screen does not update properly and still shows the “in check” text incorrectly – which is a bug.  It happens if either you or the computer opponent is in check, so something to bear in mind.

Neon Knights

All the standard chess rules are present here – even the en passant moves for the pawns, which I did see happen on this version too despite the other features being cut down. Getting yourself out of check does work fine, and the inputting of the co-ordinates at least makes sense, although on a couple of occasions it would flag an illegal move without explaining why this was.  Occasionally on this version it would exit out after fifty moves from the start for no reason – a checkmate or stalemate was not declared so not sure how this would have arisen, but sounds like a bug to watch out for.

Graphics and Sound

The graphics in Master Chess are functional, with each of the pieces are recognisable as to what they represent with the board in two dimensions.  The board’s colour scheme is at least better here, and makes it easier on the eyes.  There however is hardly any sound apart from the odd beep when a move is made, and so you are best putting on some relaxing music of your own during play should you wish.  I suspect this was also a compromise due to the memory limitations.

Final Thoughts

Master Chess for me appears to have had a few too many compromises here to try and fit the game into the limited memory.  Whilst not having an action replay makes sense, removing the function to keep track of which pieces are taken makes less sense.  Add to that there are several bugs (and present on either loader version too) and that detracts somewhat from playing, especially with the in-check message continuing to appear on screen and giving you misinformation about the state of the board.   There are better chess games available for this system and sadly Master Chess is not one of them – for Mastertronic completists only I am afraid.

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