List of Engines With Attractive Playing Style ;-)

[Albert Silver]

So, my favourite engines going by style regardless of its strength is

(...)

I would like to know your list...

This is in no particular order:

1) Hiarcs 2007 Paderborn (I don't have it, but a number of the games Ive seen show it to be very optimistic and entertaining)

2) Fruit 2.3.4n

3) Tiger Gambit 2.0

4) Mchess Pro 8

5) CSTal (here too, only seen the games, but looks fun)

6) Junior 10

7) The King (engine from Chessmaster series)

All the above engines are noted optimists, with extensive attacking heuristics, and produce some very entertaining games.

Albert

[swami]

This is in no particular order:
4) Mchess Pro 8
Albert

Thanks for the list, Albert. I'd like to know what is special about Mchess Pro and what's its rating?

IIRC I think Thorsten said he's in touch with Marty and that there's a possibility that Mchess UCI will be released someday.

[Eraserheads]

Here's my list:

Intuitive-Sacrificial-Artistic Group (more tendency to sacrifice pieces; or play with an attractive, entertaining style)

1) Junior 7 - I'm obviously a fan of this version. Can't say enough about Junior 7.
2) CSTAL2 - Never fails to entertain me.
3) Glaurung 1.2.1 / Glaurung 2.1 - I think Glaurung is like a Junior 7 on steroids. Where Junior 7 failed in strength, Glaurung delivered.


Aggressive Group (shows a relentless attacking style; might sacrifice something here or there sometimes; as demanded by the position)

1) Gandalf - Quite aggressive, and has a tendency also to find deep sacs quickly, like in the Rotlevei-Rubinstein game.
2) The King engine - by itself, it is one aggressive engine. Some personalities are worthy of having their own separate executables like the LOGAN personality (drawmaster) and the Marshall Personality (likes to play coffeehouse style chess. More of a cheap shot style not found in other engines. Very good against humans.
3) Gambit Tiger 1 and 2 (since its code has predilection to attack the enemy King, I often see Gambit Tiger play towards the kingside.
4) WChess - back then WChess was rated as the most aggressive engine on the planet (I think somewhere around 1997-1998). I made loose backups of Computer Chess on the net before and I recall having seen a graph showing WChess as the most aggressive, while Genius the most Solid.
5) Thinker 5.1 Passive - from its few games I saw, I'd say we have a tiger here.
6) HIARCS - HIARCS is the top engine which besides improving playing strength, also maintains a very fresh and entertaining style every time an upgrade comes along.
7) MChess - Rated as the second most aggressive engine in the retro list I mentioned. From the games it played, I'd say they were right about its style.
8) Fritz 2 - Some people claim that Fritz 2 was the wildest Fritz of them all.
9) Virtual Chess 2 - play against it even on 1sec/move and you'd conclude that it is one very aggressive anti-human chess program. It's use of computer tactics is very instructive. It is a nightmare to play against. If you want to study the clever use of tactics against humans, this is a good bet. I find it harder to play blitz against Virtual than Shredder or Chess Tiger 14. It was the engine which scored the most points against humans in the Harvard Cup of 1995, gaining as performance rating of 2680.