Chess for the masses

I am an avid chess player and a fan of playing against a computer. For you chess die-hards out there, my rating tends to hover in the 1850-1950 range. I certainly like Fritz for its overall calculating strength, but it's not very friendly for my children (who happen to like cartoon like characters, etc. So I opted for the Chessmaster series).

Chessmaster is fairly well known for its ease of use, and many functions. I have played many games against the computer (testing their ELO rating system for accuracy), and it seems to be fairly close as long as you start out and follow the suggested opponent advice after each game. Otherwise, it does not give a very close approximation.

The graphics are great and you get many choices as far as which board you use, whether it is 2D or 3D (or even true 3D, as it comes with 3D glasses...and yes, the 3D does look rather cool). For the person who doesn't want too many frills, you can turn off functions and just play some chess. In training mode, you can ask for help, turn on overlays for pieces that are exposed, or for areas of control on the board. Quite nice, and it does help sometimes.

The strength of the system plays from the ridiculous level all the way to incredibly strong. I have lost many games playing against the Chessmaster. I have drawn a couple, but not yet won against the Chessmaster on full strength.

Here is my complaint...When playing at some of the lower club levels, the computer opponent will sometimes make a completely insane sacrifice that no logical, decent chess playing individual would make (I.e. Trading a rook for a bishop in a position where I can easily convert that imbalance into a win). This is not to say that the computer does not make good sacrifices for a sure win. But every now and then, I get annoyed by the simple sacrifice by the computer when it doesn't do anything productive on the board. Perhaps this is Ubisoft's way of simulating a mistake that you can take advantage of. Overall, I'm impressed.