Chessmaster: The Art of Learning US version

[wraggster]

New from SuccessHK (http://www.superufo.com/product_html/Nintendo_DS_Chessmaster__The_Art_of_Learning_US_ve rsion.html?aff_id=24)

http://www.superufo.com/item_photo/item/NDS-0816-L.jpg

International Chessmaster Josh Waitzkin coaches players through courses and tutorials adapted from his book, The Art of Learning.

[SuperInfinity]

Everything about this game sucks.

Josh Waitzkin sucks for many reasons.

The sounds sucks (it sounds okay at the start but is not something you'd want to play chess to).

The board layout sucks.

The ratings system sucks.

The fact that the smallest time limit is ten minutes sucks... I would think people would be far more likely to want to play with five minutes each. Normally online I prefer one minute each even more. This could have very easily been done, they could even have let you connect to the internet to a free chess server like fics. But with such a lazy title they couldn't even let you choose your time limit, you can't even use a set amount of time plus increment for each move.

The controls suck. Why not use the buttons originally to indicate a certain move? It might take a bit of practice but would end up way faster. Or at least let us use the DS stylus for it, but I'm positive that by hitting two or three buttons, you could make any legal move possible in less than a second.

The "personalities", the famous gimmick in Chessmaster games, is very little more interesting than if they just all played normal.

The minigames etc. are utter filth. Virtual Chess 64 made a lot better job of this sort of thing. There's no real tutorials or anything like that in this.

Honestly, you may as well be playing real people online than this.