New engine releases & news H2 2024

[ydebilloez]

Belofte 2.1.8 released
http://macchess.internetcontact.be/dev-belofte.php
https://sourceforge.net/projects/belofte/

This is a long wait for 2 years.... Versions available for Win/Mac/Linux 32/64. No ARM/iOS/Mx yet.

The version is a mix of 2.1.3 version (the best performer on CCRL) with some speedups and additions of the versions 2.1.4 through 2.1.7 without the regressions introduced there.
In internal self-tests, it performs better (100 elo) than 2.1.3.

Any feedback welcome.

Yves

[ydebilloez]

Belofte 2.1.8.1 released.

This fixes a bug introduced in 2.1.8 that had following effects:

• invalid results claim in winboard protocol when giving check
• invalid calculation of avoiding check in last depth of search tree

Both in case that check could be avoided only by a move of Queen or Bishop or Rook move that had to move 2 cases at least.

"#","PLAYER","RATING","ERROR","POINTS","PLAYED","(%)","CFS(%)"
2,"Belofte 2.1.8.1",1123.9,40.7,140.00,258,54.26,69
5,"Belofte 2.1.8.1 (wb)",1106.1,41.6,132.50,258,51.36,68
6,"Belofte 2.1.8",1096.5,40.3,127.50,256,49.80,90
7,"Belofte 2.1.8 (wb)",1069.4,39.6,117.00,257,45.53,96

[sscg13]

Frolic (XB+UCI) for chess was released two months ago (still under the name SSGC13 Chess Engine at that time - meanwhile changed to Frolic)
(initially started as a plain shatranj chess engine)
author: Chris Bao

https://github.com/sscg13/sscg13-chess- ... s/tag/nnue

...snip...

In a quick test > 2500 rating points at CCRL scale
tc 0:10+0.2 start positions: UHO_2024_6mvs_+100_+109 concurrency: 4 (0 time losses etc.)

Code: Select all

   # PLAYER               :   RATING  ERROR  POINTS  PLAYED    (%)
   1 Frolic_Current-64    :  2577.34  36.72   184.5     298  61.91
   2 Tcheran_30-64        :  2485.00   ----   113.5     298  38.09

White advantage = 101.72 +/- 17.98
Draw rate (equal opponents) = 29.30 % +/- 2.96

...snip...

I will assume this is the PSQT version - I'm currently working on a NNUE version using original data (starting from a "random evaluation") - expect to see updates and potentially a more official release (for the next TCEC season, if strength allows) in the next few months.

Yes it seems so, I accidentally checked the 'nn/nnue' column in my chronology, because you 'released' it under the 'nnue' tag and I did not check
the sources because you already had provided a compilation.
The compilation/release date was 08/08/2024, but I see now the sources for this release are even three months older.
(also changed this date now in my chronology = YM-LW column, explanations for all columns in TOC)

I released it under the "nnue" tag because it did technically support NNUE through the "EvalFile" option - the only issue was that I never trained any net to go along with it, so it was essentially only PSQT. The next release, when I get to it, will have an embedded NNUE file.

[Andres Valverde]

New EveAnn 2.1 released, details at :

https://sites.google.com/view/dirtychess

[Pyronomy]

Hi!

I am excited to release the first major version of my toy engine, toad: https://github.com/dannyhammer/toad/releases/tag/v1.0.0

I've not yet calculated its exact strength, but I definitely it is not a strong engine as it only has a few basic search/eval features. I've got a lot of improvements in the backlog and intend to release new versions as development continues.

Thanks!

[Chris Formula]

Obsidian 14: https://github.com/gab8192/Obsidian/releases

[Gabor Szots]

Belofte 2.1.8 released
http://macchess.internetcontact.be/dev-belofte.php
https://sourceforge.net/projects/belofte/

Hello Yves,

Nice progress, take a look at the CCRL blitz list.

[ydebilloez]

Nice progress, take a look at the CCRL blitz list.

Thanks Gabor. Working on 2.1.9 now, internal tests show 2.1.8.1 being 20 points above 2.1.8 and 2.1.9 another 30 points. But will only release if I have a solid improvement.

[nocturn9x]

Hello there! I recently released Heimdall 1.1.1, you can check it out here: https://git.nocturn9x.space/nocturn9x/h ... /tag/1.1.1

It appears Heimdall still hasn't been picked up for Blitz testing, any particular reason why?

[Gabor Szots]

Alpaca 0.2.6

https://github.com/bbogdan95/alpaca/releases/tag/v0.2.6