• Codex@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    It took me many years before I got back to where I could enjoy chess and similar games as just fun things to pass time. For a long while, I didn’t find games fun when I knew they had been “solved.” It didn’t matter whether I personally could memorize and execute on that knowledge.

    This applied to video games too. If there was a perfect build or an optimal meta or a flawless strategy, the mere existence of it ruined the game for me. It seemed pointless to work on getting better when “perfect” had been achieved.

    I think playing a lot of competitive fighting games helped. Realizing that “optimal” didn’t always mean flawless execution, and that there’s still fun just in seeing what you can train yourself to be capable of doing. It actually helped me a lot in understanding that if a game is fun, then that’s what matters, the fun. Strategy and optimizing and “the meta” can be part of the fun, but if they aren’t then ignore them, play at your level, and keep finding the fun.

    • Kalcifer@sh.itjust.works
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      9 months ago

      For a long while, I didn’t find games fun when I knew they had been “solved.”

      Chess is not a solved game.

        • funkless_eck@sh.itjust.works
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          9 months ago

          one of the issues with solving chess is that

          one engame with 7 pieces remaining is solved provided you can memorize 549 exact moves that forces a checkmate, but there is a rule that you must capture a piece or move a pawn once every 50 moves or else it’s a draw.

          the other issue is that to solve for a perfect game you need to calculate every possible decision tree. It is easier to map every single atom in every star system currently detectable by any means from the Earth than it is to map every chess move.

            • Thoth19@lemmy.world
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              9 months ago

              19 TB is not that big anymore. For a company that buys storage systems, the more standard amount of useable space is going to be closer to a PB per system.

        • TheIllustrativeMan@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          I think standard openings will get more and more moves added to them, but even at the highest level of chess there are still many valid openings, and many valid responses to each of those openings. Then, even after playing those “known openings”, it very quickly ceases to be solved.

    • MBM@lemmings.world
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      9 months ago

      Part of the reason why I can’t get into Rubik’s cubes, and it also lingers in the back of my mind with puzzles like sudoku or minesweeper.

      • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        I have to admit that it’s hard for me to play a game with an ending when I know I probably won’t ever win.