WMCCC 1995

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The Thirteenth World Microcomputer Chess Championship took place from October 10-15, 1995, in the Library of the Paderborn University, Paderborn, Germany.

Two Computer World Championships in one year. After the 8th World Computer Chess Championship in Shatin, Hong Kong - China in May, the 13th WMCCC in Paderborn was held in October, hosted and organized by the ICCA and the Paderborn University. There were 34 participants, a record so far, 14 programs from Germany, four Dutch and British each, three from United States and Russia, one each from Austria, France, Denmark, Israel, Spain and Switzerland. The 13. WMCCC was simultaneously the 5th International Paderborn Computer Chess Championship.

=Final Standing= 13th World Microcomputer Chess Championship, Oct. 1995, Paderborn GER
 * CC Country Codes
 * SOS: Sum of Opponent Scores
 * SoDOS: Sum of Defeated Opponent Scores

=Participants= 13th World Microcomputer Chess Championship, Oct. 1995, Paderborn GER  =Photos & Games= Round 7, MChess Pro 5.0 operated by Peter Schreiner (right) vs. Quest by Frans Morsch [Event "WMCCC 1995"] [Site "Paderborn, Germany"] [Date "1995.10.12"] [Round "7"] [White "MChess Pro 5.0"] [Black "Quest"] [Result "1-0"]
 * CC Country Codes

1.e4 e5 2.Bc4 Nc6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.d3 Bb4 5.Ne2 Na5 6.Bb3 O-O 7.O-O d6 8.Bg5 c6 9.d4 Bg4 10.f3 Bh5 11.Na4 Nxb3 12.axb3 h6 13.Bh4 Re8 14.c3 Ba5 15.Qd3 b5 16.b4 Bc7 17.dxe5 Rxe5 18.Ng3 g5 19.f4 gxh4 20.fxe5 hxg3 21.Rxf6 gxh2+ 22.Kh1 bxa4 23.Raf1 Qf8 24.e6 Qg7 25.exf7+ Kf8 26.Qa6 Bb6 27.Qb7 Rd8 28.Re6 1-0

=Photos= A Tropism towards Trophies, The professional trophy awarded to Chess Genius by Richard Lang, the absolute World Champion, MChess Pro 5.0 represented by Peter Schreiner

=Games=
 * Some games between top contenders with analyze and graph evaluation on Lichess :
 * Chess Genius - Ferret :
 * Chess Genius - Quest :
 * Ferret - MChess Pro 5.0 :
 * MChess Pro 5.0 - Dark Thought :
 * MChess Pro 5.0 - Quest :
 * Quest - Ferret :

=The Tournament= The host was represented by two programs, Cheiron and Alpha I, a single processor version of Zugzwang. Reigning World Microcomputer Champion HIARCS wasn't represented by Mark Uniacke, but a local operator, who unfortunately lost some time between moves up and then. MChess on the other hand was operated by an encouraged Peter Schreiner with great care. Richard Lang was abort on behalf of Chess Genius, Johan de Koning with The King. From the United States Bruce Moreland was present, while Junior was operated by local university staff. Fritz, who just won the Shannon Trophy a few months before did not participate in person, but his twin brother Quest by Frans Morsch.

Titles
After a lot of tough and thrilling matches, the title of the Professional Microcomputer Chess Champion was finally shared between MChess Pro 5.0 by Marty Hirsch and Chess Genius by Richard Lang, which were tied with 8 out of 11 each. The title of the "absolute" Microcomputer Chess Champion was decided by a playoff, which was won by MChess. Ferret by Bruce Moreland from the United States played a strong tournament and became third a half point behind the top scorers, and gained the World Amateur Microcomputer Chess Champion title, since the tied Nimzo 3 by Chrilly Donninger et al., from Austria, had to withdrawal the playoff for logistical reasons, after already being late due to the nerve-racking Blitz playoff. World Blitz Computer Chess Champion was won by The King by Johan de Koning from The Netherlands in 9 playoff matches against Nimzo 3.

System Tal vs XXXX
A small anecdote appeared in the last round between Chess System Tal by Chris Whittington versus Martin Zentner's XXXX (FourX). Instead of a queen-promotion with a fast mate, the graphical System Tal board indicated a minor promotion to a knight! System Tal operator Thorsten Czub played the move over the board and had to resign on behalf of Chess System Tal, while Chris, already celebrating the safe point in the cafeteria, was not amused when he arrived back on the board. A bug in a graphics drawing routine indexed the wrong piece and caused some rule discussions in the news groups. Chris on place argued the PVs, as stored inside a log-file, indicated the mate score and the correct moves. Nevertheless, Tournament Director Jaap van den Herik was unpersuadable.

=Winner's Curse= With hindsight MChess' title of the "absolute" Microcomputer Chess Champion wasn't the expected commercial breakthrough of the MS-DOS program. Windows 95 was already dominating the PC-market, and the trials by his European Distributor Martin Stamer to place a DOS program in the mass market was not that successful. Due to some formal advertisement faults by Stamer and some questionable and euphoric statements in his Chess Computer Catalogue 1996, problems arose, with monetary consequences for the programmers under contract, Marty Hirsch and Gerd Isenberg. Mutual preliminary injunction initiated by Stamer's business rival Ossi Weiner and continuous court cases over years was the consequence. In February 1997 Marty made a public accusation against his former distributor in a newsgroup, while he was already about to collaborate with Weiner. The German Magazine Computerschach und Spiele broached that issue, where Stamer made a counterstatement.

=Publications=
 * Ulf Lorenz (1995). Report on the 13th World Microcomputer-Chess Championship. ICCA Journal, Vol. 18, No. 4
 * Rainer Feldmann (1995). The 13th World Microcomputer-Chess Championship. Results and Selected Games. ICCA Journal, Vol. 18, No. 4
 * Larry Kaufman (1996). 13th World Microcomputer Chess Championship. Computer Chess Reports, Vol. 5, Nos. 3+4
 * Eric Hallsworth (1995/1996). World Micro-Computer Championships 1995. Selective Search 61, pp. 8, pdf hosted by Mike Watters

=Forum Posts=
 * MChess5.0 defeats ChessGenius in Playoff 1-0 to be WMCC Champion! by rmreich, rgc, October 17, 1995
 * TOP 10 REASONS WHY YOU SHOULD STOP PROGRAMMING CHESS by Martin Zentner, rgcc, October 20, 1995
 * TOP 10 REASONS WHY YOU SHOULD STOP PROGRAMMING by Thomas Kerrigan, rgcc, October 24, 1995
 * ICCA rules, was TOP 10 REASONS... by Thomas Kerrigan, rgcc, October 29, 1995
 * ICCA rules by Martin Zentner, rgcc, October 31, 1995

=External Links=
 * 13th World Microcomputer Chess Championship from the ICGA Tournament Database
 * 13th World Microcomputer Chess Championship, Oct. 1995, Paderborn GER from the CSVN site
 * World Microcomputer Chess Championship - 13th WMCCC - 1995 Paderborn by Mark Weeks
 * 13th World Microcomputer Chess Championship, Paderborn 1995 by Volker Richey
 * 13. WMCCC Paderborn 1995 from Schachcomputer.info - Wiki (German)

=References=

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