Netflix’s The Queen’s Gambit a hit on mainstream media

11/18/2020 – In a recent review for ChessBase, Albert Silver stated that Netflix’s ‘The Queen’s Gambit’ was “the best chess-related movie or series to grace the screen, from the tour de force performance by Anya Taylor-Joy to the gorgeous cinematography”. But, is this opinion shared only by the loyal legions of chess fanatics? Or is the series actually a hit? According to the ratings and the reviews on mainstream media, it is one of the best releases of the year!

Autumn Series on Playchess – Your way to PowerPlay training

11/18/2020 – 90 minutes online chess training with PowerPlay author Grandmaster Daniel King. This is the first prize in the 4th tournament of the Autumn Series on Playchess, a nine round Swiss blitz tournament that will start on Wednesday, November 18, 20.00 CET (19:00 UTC, 14:00 ET). As in all tournaments of the Autumn Series, the games will be played under real names.

Grandmaster Chess Ep 1: Vidit's flawless win over Kramnik

11/18/2020 – Grandmaster Chess is a series hosted by IM Sagar Shah on the ChessBase India YouTube channel. The idea of the series is to give you a peek into the mind of a world class grandmaster. Every episode has a GM who shows his immortal game with 10 critical questions. Four famous stand-up comedians of India - Samay Raina, Biswa Kalyan Rath, Vaibhav Sethia and Anirban Dasgupta are the participants. It's a synthesis of great chess education by the GM along with a liveliness of the comedians! The first episode had GM Vidit Gujrathi who showed his immortal win against GM Vladimir Kramnik. We have all the 10 critical moments for you to solve! Try your hand and see how you fare!

Vahap Sanal leads Turkish Championship after five rounds

11/17/2020 – The 2020 Turkish Championship is taking place in Kemer, a seaside resort and district of Antalya Province on the Mediterranean coast. The event is a 10-player single round-robin. Defending champion and rating favourite Vahap Sanal is leading the standings table on 4 out of 5. Kivanc Haznedaroglu is in sole second place after beating women’s national champion Ekaterina Atalik. | Pictured: Vahap Sanal facing Ataberk Eren in round 4 | Photo: Official site

New: ChessBase 16

11/17/2020 – ChessBase 16 has the key to fresh ideas, precise analyses and targeted training! With the new repertoire recommendations, main variations, secondary variations, attacking, gambits, and brand new, "fashion", you can focus on openings better than ever. Furthermore, recognition to detect weak points against your opponents can be added to your opening preparation. With the Novelty-Mining feature, you can dig deep for opening treasures. And there are many more novelties...
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The Weekly Show: Happy Birthday Mickey Adams!

11/17/2020 – In his "Weekly Show" IM Lawrence Trent congratulates Mickey Adams, who celebrates birthday today. Lawrence looks at the game J. Polgar vs M. Adams, 1999 and talks about the career of the English top grandmaster. | Lawrence's show is available at 18:00 UTC (19:00 CET, 14:00 ET) on-demand with a ChessBase Premium Account. You can register a Premium account here. | Photo: Ray Morris-Hill

Speed Chess Championship: Artemiev beats Giri

11/17/2020 – In the last match of the round of the last 16 at the chess.com Speed Chess Championship Vladislav Artemiev played against Anish Giri. The blitz matches were close but the bullet games helped Artemiev to win the match and to qualify for the quarterfinal. | Picture: Chess.com

King's slalom

11/17/2020 – Connected passed pawns can be very dangerous - in the middlegame but of course also in the endgame. However, as dangerous as connected passed pawns may be, sometimes they need a little help from their king. Do you see how the white king can effectively support his pawns in the diagram position?

NEW: Mega Database 2021

11/17/2020 – Welcome to the new Mega Database 2021! Learn from annotated games, enjoy top tournaments or have a look at the opening repertoire of the world's best! The Mega Database 2021 contains more than 8,4 million games. With a current ChessBase program and our update service you can regularly update the database with new games – round about 5,000 every week!
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Simon Says: A Quick Guide to the Jobava London System

11/16/2020 – In this "Simon Says" show the Ginger GM takes a look at another interesting and dangerous opening weapon: the Jobava London System. | Watch "Simon Says" on-demand and with a ChessBase Premium account). (Normally 18:00 UTC (19:00 CET / 14:00 ET).

Speedchess: Duda dominates Caruana

11/16/2020 – The Sunday chess.com Speed Chess Championship match between Fabiano Caruana and Jan-Krzyszof Duda ended with a surprisingly clear win of the young Polish player who won 17-9 against the world's number two. Duda particularly dominated in the bullet games. | Picture: chess.com

ChessBase 16 - The new features (Part 5)

11/16/2020 – ChessBase 16 is already in the starting blocks and will be released on 17th November 2020. Now everyone wants to know: what are the new features in this version? What innovations are on the horizon? And what is the "key to new ideas"? Jeroen Van Den Belt, who has been active for ChessBase since Fritz 7, presents interesting innovations in the video. The last part of the five-part series deals with the new "chat" design and its features.
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Vlastimil Hort: Memories of Prague's chess café U Nováků

11/16/2020 – For decades, the chess café at the U Nováků shopping mall had been the center of Prague's chess community. This is where the bohemian society used to meet to play billiards, cards and chess, and it is also where the career of more than one world famous player began. Vlastimil Hort reminisces about the "golden age".

Hackery (Pt. 2)

11/15/2020 – Star columnist Jon Speelman continues to look at games where hacking (or hackery — the two are more or less interchangeable in his mind) plays a key role. “In a time still dominated by lockdowns we need entertainment, and a blood sport which doesn’t spill real blood seems ideal”, asserts Speelman. | Pictured: Thai Dai Van Nguyen | Photo: iSport.cz

Speedchess Live: Caruana vs. Duda

11/15/2020 – World number 2 Fabiano Caruana and Polish star Jan-Krzysztof Duda are facing each other in the seventh match of the round-of-16 at the Speed Chess Championship. They will play 90 minutes of 5+1 blitz, 60 minutes of 3+1 blitz, and 30 minutes of 1+1 bullet chess. Follow the games live, with commentary. Start: 18:00 CET, 9 a.m. Pacific.

CBM 197: Opening preparation

11/15/2020 – ChessBase Magazine offers a window to the world of professional chess and it also provides arsenal for the tournament player. We are pleased to inform readers that we have just released CBM #198. Meanwhile, we have received an article on the treatment of openings by Prof. Nagesh Havanur. As this may be of practical use to young players, we are offering it to our readers. | Pictured: Richard Rapport | Photo: Georgios Souleidis

Champions Chess Tour with $1.5 million in prizes to kick off next week

11/14/2020 – Following the success of the Magnus Carlsen Tour, chess24 and the Play Magnus Group announced the $1.5 million Champions Chess Tour, a series of ten online tournaments featuring elite players. The action kicks off November 22 with the first ‘Regular’ tournament, the Skilling Open. Six ‘Regular’ tournaments, three ‘Majors’ and the ‘Finals’ will take place from November 2020 until September 2021.

Grandmaster Chef: Ding Liren

11/14/2020 – China’s top-ranked player, and number 3 in the world, Grandmaster Ding Liren has twice been a Candidate, first in 2018 and again in 2020. National Master Mike Walder annotates Liren-Caruana from the 2020 Candidates Tournament and presents a recipe for a dish that Liren might enjoy. WIM Alexey Root tells why Liren is a Grandmaster Chef honoree. | Photo: Lennart Ootes / Altibox Norway Chess

Daniel King’s Power Play Show: The artistry of Judit Polgar

11/13/2020 – In this Power Play Show, GM Daniel King takes a look at the artistry of Judit Polgar, the best women player in the history of chess. | Power Play is on air most Fridays at 17:00 UTC (18:00 CET, 13:00 ET). All the usual puzzles, games and instruction will be on offer. | Photo: Global Chess Festival

Let's talk about Chess: Sabina Foisor

11/13/2020 – In his podcast "Let's talk abour Chess" Eric van Reem chats with various chess players and chess fans, and his latest guest was WGM Sabina Foisor. In a frank and open interview Foisor talks about her life as a chess professional in the US, her new book "Sherlock's Method", the "Queen's Gambit", women's chess, and the untimely death of her mother. | Photo: Saint Louis Chess Center

ChessBase 16 - The new features (Part 4)

11/13/2020 – ChessBase 16 is already in the starting blocks and will be released on 17th November 2020. Now everyone wants to know: what are the new features in this version? What innovations are on the horizon? And what is the "key to new ideas"? Jeroen Van Den Belt, who has been active for ChessBase since Fritz 7, presents interesting innovations in the video. Part 4 of the five-part series deals with "raytracing", what it means and what it can be used for.

Magnus Carlsen: “We’re trying to grow chess”

11/13/2020 – In a lengthy interview with Jon Tisdall for the US Chess Federation website, world champion Magnus Carlsen touches on a number of topical issues in the world of chess — his role as promoter and organizer, playing online and the future of classical chess. Carlsen also talks about his deal with Unibet and how this sparked problems between him and the Norwegian federation. | Photo: Lennart Ootes / Altibox Norway Chess

Nakamura vs. Martirosyan: A clear result

11/13/2020 – Hikaru Nakamura was simply a bit too strong for the Armenian Haik Martirosyan in their Speed Chess Championship match on chess.com. Nakamura won the blitz and bullet match 21-5, and lost only one of the 26 games. Despite the short time controls and the lopsided result the match offered many interesting and instructive games.

With minimal means

11/13/2020 – In the diagram position, Black can use mate motifs to achieve perfect coordination of his few remaining pieces. Spot Black's three power moves - and leave White no chance!