Chess Vision Trainer 3.0

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• Quick specs
• Price: Free to try (7-day trial); $29.95 to buy
• Operating system: Windows 98/Me/2000/XP/NT
• Date added: June 28, 2004
• Total Downloads: 17,247
• Downloads last week: 45
• See full specifications

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CNET editors' review

Reviewed by: CNET Staff

It's not often that we can say that a software program is both annoying and successful. But in this case, both are true.

A genuine training program rather than a game itself, this application is aimed at teaching chess players better visualization and strategic skills. To this end, it always displays the position of the pieces as they were a half turn or more in the past, rather than as they actually are. In theory, this forces a player to keep moves in his or her head, rather than constantly relying on rechecking the board. We can't say that we achieved Grandmaster status while testing the program, but the theory seems sound; and indeed, we certainly found ourselves exhausted as quickly as if we were studying for an exam.

The interface and graphics are simplistic here, but that's not the point. Any chess player who wants a little intellectual basic training may find this a useful taskmaster.

Publisher's description

Chess Vision Trainer is a chess training system designed to develop and improve your visualization and move calculation skills in Chess. Visualization and calculation plays a major role in chess. These are the skills that separate the masters from the amateurs. The built-in chess-playing engine acts as your training partner. The position displayed on the chessboard is not the true position but the past position a certain number of half-moves before the true position. You do not decide the moves based on the displayed position but based on the true position (which you do not see but you are trying to visualize). This means that you are always forced to look ahead of the chess position you see in the board.

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