Private rating test of Nintendo Fritz DS completed

Monsieur Plastique · Post by **Monsieur Plastique** » Mon Mar 03, 2014 7:54 pm

I have finally completed a 100 game private rating test for the Nintendo DSi console running Fritz Chess. All opponent programs were running on their 40 moves in 2 hour tournament levels. The Nintendo was set to it's maximum possible thinking time, which works out on average to be around 40 moves in 80 minutes. It will often be faster or slower than that depending on position complexity, but at no stage during the rating test games did it ever come remotely close to losing on time. The Fritz Chess game settings to achieve this response time were:

Game: Long
Time: 23:59
Number of moves: 1
Strength: Grandmaster 2320 ELO.

Fritz Chess was running on a standard Nintendo DSi console and all player aids, music, hints, coaching, etc were disabled. The opponents were chosen based on availability, relative strength (where possible) and the existence of an SSDF rating. For the Saitek Expert Travel, I used the GK2100 SSDF rating and for Mephisto Master Chess I used the Milano Pro SSDF rating.

The final rating was calculated using the FIDE procedures for new, unrated players, as outlined in their handbook (July 2013 rules, which are the current ones). The ratings I used for the machines it played against were as per the SSDF Rating List dated 11th November, 2013.

The reason I chose to rate the Nintendo using the FIDE guidelines is because in my view, the only other way to calculate a reasonably accurate comparable rating would be for the SSDF to accept my 100 games, add them to their database and create a new rating list. Obviously none of those things are going to happen. I believe the rating I calculated using the FIDE guidelines is conservative, as FIDE treats scores over 50% for unrated players quite conservatively in comparison to players who already have ratings (the latter using the dp expectancy tables). Years ago it was even more conservative (12.5 points for each half point over 50%, but nowadays it is 15 points). In the event of a score below 50%, the standard dp tables apply.

Anyway, the crosstable for the 100 games is shown below:

40 moves in 2 hours

Fritz DS - Mephisto Miami 17.5 - 4.5 +15/=5/-2 79.55%
Fritz DS - Mephisto MM V 8.0 - 4.0 +7/=2/-3 66.67%
Fritz DS - Mephisto MM IV 10.5 - 1.5 +10/=1/-1 87.50%
Fritz DS - Mephisto Roma 32 bit 5.5 - 2.5 +5/=1/-2 68.75%
Fritz DS - Saitek Expert Travel 9.5 - 10.5 +8/=3/-9 47.50%
Fritz DS - Mephisto Master Chess 2.5 - 3.5 +2/=1/-3 41.67%
Fritz DS - Novag Sapphire II 3.0 - 5.0 +2/=2/-4 37.50%
Fritz DS - Novag Super Constellation 6.0 - 0.0 +6/=0/-0 100.00%
Fritz DS - Fidelity Excellence 6.0 - 0.0 +6/=0/-0 100.00%

The rating then, calculated as per the FIDE handbook for new, unrated players is:

1910 ELO

So this places it 3 points ahead of the Novag Diablo and 9 points behind the 16 bit Mephisto Almeria.

Cyberchess · Post by **Cyberchess** » Tue Mar 04, 2014 10:48 pm

Thank you for testing these dedicated units with the Nintendo DSi console.

Have you downloaded MAME for your PC?

Regards,
John

Monsieur Plastique · Post by **Monsieur Plastique** » Wed Mar 05, 2014 12:48 am

Hi John,

I seem to recall downloading it some years back, but only for the sole purpose of seeing if it was worth buying a Nintendo console for chess. I do not use those sorts of emulators as in my view they are arguably illegal unless one already owns the original ROMs in physical form (and I don't apart from having legal ROMs of Fritz Chess for the Nintendo of course).

I have used the MESS emulation, however, but only for those programs where the original copyright owner of the material has released them and approved them for authorised use. For example, various vintage Mephisto ROMs from the 1980s:

http://www.top-5000.nl/mephisto.htm

Cyberchess · Post by **Cyberchess** » Wed Mar 05, 2014 1:23 am

Greetings Monsieur Plastique:

I quite understand your concern pertaining to game copyrights, however, some of the developers of the early vector graphics based video games have bequeathed them to the MAME development team:

http://www.mamedev.org/roms/

You are free to download and enjoy these vintage gems, though unfortunately no arcade versions of any type of chess exist to the best of my knowledge. MAME specifically emulates many arcade platforms, while other emulators emulate the home video platforms, such as Sega, Neo-Geo, NES, etc.

Many years ago an engineer patented a coin-operated arcade chess computer, but this machine was never actually produced -- probably because a game of chess takes too long for most of us to play out.

Regards,
John