Game Review: Master Chess (Commodore 64, 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.  It claims that special emphasis has been placed on providing facilities useful to those wishing to improve their game.  The instructions, to be fair, do mention this in further detail with the ability to pause the game at any time, and effectively 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 and see how well (or not) that you would do.  The instructions are comprehensive and it is well worth reading them whilst the game loads.  The Commodore 64 version would also be the first of several formats to receive this chess game.

As The Actress Said to the Bishop

When the game initially loads, you will see that the chess board is made of yellow and grey squares, with the pieces in white or black for each colour.  Immediately you see a problem in that white pieces on a yellow background are going to be awful on the eyes, with no way of changing the colour to something more visually appealing.  Add the yellow background to that, and it really is not a good start.   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.  It can be as little as one second if you wish to have a quick game, but thirty is recommended in the inlay, and you can make this as long as you like.   There is, unfortunately, no two-player mode, which would have at least allowed you to play a friend and have a game of chess where the skill levels might be the same on both sides.  This is a real let down even before you start a game to be honest.  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.

Down the Elephant and Castle

Whoever is white starts the game first, and the grid is laid out with letters A to H along the bottom, and 1 to8 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 D3 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.    You can also during any time press the space bar to see which pieces have been taken, so you know what is left from each side.

Keeping in Check

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.  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.  Anything other than W or B clears the square.  So, for example WP puts a white pawn on the square, BN adds a black knight – and the shorthand is again detailed in the instructions.  You can also replay the game from the start, pressing space for each next move.  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.

Knights of the Square Table

As you play the moves, they are all recorded on the right-hand side of the board (and are replayed when using the replay option) and has notational shorthand, so E3xE6 might be a move from a rook (or castle) and taking another piece, moving from E3 to E6.  If you put in say 300 seconds of computer thinking time and it may be too long, you can press RETURN to force a best move at that point, although you may wish to amend the time given instead.  If for example I selected 10 seconds per move, often it would be 15 seconds before the move was made, which sort of defeats the object of having a move timer for the computer opponent.

Checkmate Charlie

All the standard chess rules are present here – even the en passant moves for the pawns, or to take the rook or castle along with the king (although getting to that point may be difficult.)  Getting yourself out of check does work fine, but often this is a precursor to the computer opponent turning the screw to trap you in all sorts of bother.   The inputting of the co-ordinates at least makes sense, although on a couple of occasions it would flag an illegal move.  That in itself does not always give you a reason why that move was illegal, which maybe would have helped people to play the game more if they had not played chess for a while.

Graphics and Sound

The graphics in Master Chess are functional. Each of the pieces are recognisable as to what they represent with the board in two dimensions.  However, the awful colour scheme of yellow and grey with the pieces really does spoil the spectacle somewhat and is lousy on the eyes.  There is also very little in the way of sound effects, just the odd noise here and there when you make a move or put in an incorrect move.  Maybe some relaxing calm peaceful music played by the SID chip in the background could have been quite soothing to listen to whilst playing, another opportunity missed.

Final Thoughts

Master Chess is attempting to be a functional chess game with additional features such as moving the board around to your liking or setting up a puzzle to play from.  However, the lack of two-player mode really lets it down initially, as well as the terrible colour scheme for the board and pieces meaning it is headache inducing to look at.  Whilst the computer opponent represents a sizeable challenge, it can often be frustrating waiting longer than expected for a move to be completed – and even with the ability to change that thinking time mid-game, it does make you wonder just how much effort was put in to make the game more enjoyable.

* * *

You know what we think but why not share your thoughts on this game! Let us know what you think of it in the comments below, or add your own score using the slider in the summary box at the top of the review!

Please follow and like us: