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Westin Bonaventure Hotel 1
- Westin Bonaventure Hotel designed by John Portman - as seen from the platform of 444 S. Flower Building, Downtown Los Angeles, Photo by Geographer, December 31, 2006, Wikimedia Commons, Westin Bonaventure Hotel from Wikipedia↩︎
The ACM's Twelfth North American Computer Chess Championship (NACCC) was held from November 8 to 11, 1981 at the Bonaventure Hotel, Los Angeles, California, USA 1 .
Mike Valvo acted as Tournament Director, replacing David Levy, who previously served in that capacity and was expected to enter his own program. Tournament guests were Shelby Lyman 2, chess commentator for WNET's television chess shows and emcee for the Fisher-Spassky World Championship Match in 1972 3 , and Isaac Kashdan, Chess Editor for the Los Angeles Times. A computer chess panel discussion and short paper presentation was part of the technical program 4 .
Contents
Final Standing
| # | Program | CC | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | P | SOS | SoDOS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Belle | US | 7w1 | 9b1 | 2w½ | 3b1 | 3½ | 10 | 8½ |
| 2 | Nuchess | US | 10b1 | 4w1 | 1b½ | 5w½ | 3 | 11 | 8 |
| 3 | Cray Blitz | US | 6b1 | 5w1 | 12b1 | 1w0 | 3 | 10 | 6½ |
| 4 | Bebe | US | 11w1 | 2b0 | 14b1 | 7b1 | 3 | 7½ | 4½ |
| 5 | Duchess | US | 15w1 | 3b0 | 8w1 | 2b½ | 2½ | 9 | 4½ |
| 6 | Philidor | GB | 3w0 | 15b1 | 9w1 | 8b½ | 2½ | 8 | 4 |
| 7 | Ostrich | CA | 1b0 | 16w1 | 11b1 | 4w0 | 2 | 8 | 1½ |
| 8 | Chess Challenger X | US | 14b1 | 12w½ | 5b0 | 6w½ | 2 | 7½ | 3 |
| 9 | L'Excentrique | CA | 16b1 | 1w0 | 6b0 | 12w1 | 2 | 7½ | 1½ |
| 10 | MyChess | US | 2w0 | 11b0 | 15w1 | 14w1 | 2 | 6½ | 2 |
| 11 | Cube 2.1 | US | 4b0 | 10w1 | 7w0 | 13b½ | 1½ | 8½ | 2¾ |
| 12 | CHAOS | US | 13w1 | 8b½ | 3w0 | 9b0 | 1½ | 8½ | 2½ |
| 13 | Schach 2.5 | DE | 12b0 | 14w0 | 16b1 | 11w½ | 1½ | 4 | ¾ |
| 14 | Chaturanga | US | 8w0 | 13b1 | 4w0 | 10b0 | 1 | 8½ | 1½ |
| 15 | Awit | CA | 5b0 | 6w0 | 10b0 | 16w1 | 1 | 7 | 0 |
| 16 | Prodigy | CA | 9w0 | 7b0 | 13w0 | 15b0 | 0 | 6½ | 0 |
Participants
Program |
CC |
Team |
Hardware |
Language |
|---|---|---|---|---|
CA |
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US |
Bit Slice Chess hardware |
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US |
||||
US |
Fred Swartz, Mike Alexander, Jack O’Keefe, |
|||
US |
68000 based Apollo workstation |
|||
US |
6502 based System |
|||
US |
Robert Hyatt, Albert Gower, |
|||
US |
||||
US |
||||
L'Excentrique |
CA |
|||
US |
||||
US |
||||
CA |
5-Nova Multiprocessing System |
|||
GB |
David Broughton, Mark Taylor, |
|||
CA |
||||
DE |
- Excalibur Electronics by ChessChallenger, Hiarcs Forum, December 22, 2015 » Belle's Attack Maps↩︎
Photos
The winner: Ken Thompson, programmer of Belle, acceps first-place trophy
from tournament organizer Monroe Newborn 7
Selected Games
In Round 4, Cray Blitz (3) versus Belle (2½), Cray Blitz played the losing 28.Qxb6, and missed to win the tournament 8 9 .
[Event "ACM 1981"]
[Site "Los Angeles USA"]
[Date "1981.11.11"]
[Round "4"]
[White "Cray Blitz"]
[Black "Belle"]
[Result "0-1"]
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6 4.Ng5 d5 5.exd5 Na5 6.Bb5+ c6 7.dxc6 bxc6 8.Qf3 Rb8
9.Bxc6+ Nxc6 10.Qxc6+ Nd7 11.d3 Be7 12.Ne4 Bb7 13.Qa4 Qc7 14.Nbc3 Bc6 15.Qc4 Qc8
16.Nd5 Bxd5 17.Qxd5 Qxc2 18.O-O f6 19.f4 Nb6 20.Qa5 Qxd3 21.Qxa7 O-O 22.Qxe7 Qxe4
23.Qe6+ Kh8 24.fxe5 fxe5 25.Rxf8+ Rxf8 26.h3 Qe1+ 27.Kh2 h6 28.Qxb6 Rf1 29.Qd8+
Kh7 30.Qd3+ e4 31.Qxf1 Qxf1 32.a3 e3 33.Bxe3 Qxa1 34.Bd4 h5 35.Bc3 g5 36.Be5 Qe1
37.Bc3 Qf2 38.Kh1 g4 39.hxg4 hxg4 40.Kh2 Qh4+ 41.Kg1 g3 42.Kf1 Kg6 0-1Game and short analyze on Lichess.org : 1
See also
Tournament Director
Publications
- The Twelfth ACM's North American Computer Chess Championship, pdf from The Computer History Museum
- Ben Mittman (1981). Twelfth ACM North American Computer Chess Championship. ICCA Newletter, Vol. 4, No. 3
- Ben Mittman, Tony Marsland, Monroe Newborn, Kathe Spracklen, Ken Thompson (1981). Computer chess: Master level play in 1981? Proceedings of the ACM '81 conference
- Craig Stinson (1982). Chess Championship: Machines Play, People Watch. Softline, Vol. 1, pdf (CGW Museum), pdf ( Internet Archive), pp. 6
Forum Posts
- Cray Blity 1981? by Joshua Lee, CCC, June 02, 2000
- Cray Blitz vs Belle [1981 North American Computer Chess Championship] by José Antônio Fabiano Mendes, CCC, August 29, 2001
- Excalibur Electronics by ChessChallenger, Hiarcs Forum, December 22, 2015 » Belle's Attack Maps, Excalibur Mirage
External Links
- ACM 1981 CSVN site
- Proceedings of the ACM '81 conference
- North American Computer-Chess Championships, complete History of Tournament Results by Theo van der Storm
- ACM COMPUTER CHESS by Bill Wall
References
Ben Mittman (1981). Tournament Announcement - ACM Tournament in Los Angeles. ICCA Newletter, Vol. 4, No. 1↩︎
Chess by Shelby Lyman, May 7, 2016 » Susan Polgar Global Chess Daily News and Information - The Chess Tech Evolution↩︎
The man behind the Fischer-Spassky show, ChessBase News, January 03, 2003↩︎
AdvanceProgram ACM 1981, November 9-11, 1981 Bonaventure Hotel, Los Angeles, California (pdf)↩︎
Ben Mittman (1981). Twelfth ACM North American Computer Chess Championship. ICCA Newletter, Vol. 4, No. 3↩︎
Image clipped from Craig Stinson (1982). Chess Championship: Machines Play, People Watch. Softline, Vol. 1, pp. 6↩︎
Re: Cray Blitz vs Belle [1981 North American Computer Chess Championship] by Robert Hyatt, CCC, August 29, 2001↩︎
How Far We've Come: 20 Years of Personal Computing by Blake Linton Wilfon, November 05, 2000↩︎