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In a ChessBase news report on Friday, Matthias Wüllenweber described (and showed) the new functions of ChessBase 18. You can watch the video, which goes on for over an hour, or you can read the description he wrote about the program below - or you can do both!
Here are the time stamps of the video:
0:00 - Intro
2:01 - The "Style Report" of CB 18
2:48 - Example Karpov: What is his playing style?
12:36 - Example Morphy: What is his playing style?
16:38 - Can we improve our "amateur" chess with this feature?
21:27 - The "Search for strategical themes" function
27:22 - Are updates provided continuously?
31:10 - What is the "Blunder report" and what is the connection to cheating in chess?
39:20 - May this be a technique on how to beat far stronger players?
42:30 - Quick Check on Magnus Carlsen - Blunder report
49:26 - David Smerdon's cheating tournament
1:00:13 - Game analysis: Smerdon vs Carlsen 2016 Baku
ChessBase 18 is all about analysing chess players. The Style Report characterizes playing style, fighting spirit, willingness to take risks and endgame skills. The Blunder Report describes how accurately a player calculates, and in which phases of the game or position which types errors accumulate.
The prerequisite for good statistics is a high number of games. The easiest way to obtain this is to access a player's online games. Of course, you already have the PlayChess games in a database. ChessBase now also offers in-built access to the games of players at Lichess or Chess.com, and provides statistical assistance as to which player is behind which accounts.
The Style Report provides three things: Firstly, a graphical overview of the main style characteristics. Secondly, observations on the style of play. Thirdly, sample games on style-relevant topics, such as the kingside attack or queenside play.
Stylistic features of Mikhail Tal until 1960: Aggressive all-rounder
Some of Tal's observations are: Strong openings - Equalises well - Keeps the queens on the board - Likes to sacrifice - Not afraid of an insecure king - Attacks - Risky, sharp play - Besieges weaknesses - Active piece play with Black - Strong with rooks - Good in technical endgames.
Here are two relevant ChessBase 18 assessment of the current World Champion:
And here is the program's assessment of his challenger:
The Blunder Report classifies errors and uses them to determine a ‘calculation Elo’, which expresses your tactical playing strength, and may well deviate from the real rating. A strong indicator of whether calculation training is required. Three graphics show what “type of error” you make, and in which phases of the game things go wrong. There are people who constantly spoil winning positions but are very accurate in bad positions and vice versa.
Colleague Brinkmann plays strongly in complex positions
It is interesting to note that the following applies to all non-super GMs and non-computers: the sharper the position, the higher the average error size. This correlation, which is always exactly linear, is a characteristic of human inaccuracy.
To prepare for other players, it is useful to know their online games. ChessBase 18 now offers direct access to Lichess and Chess.com. The donation-financed Lichess servers are buffered by us with a huge cache, so that even multiple retrievals do not create a load there.
Sometimes it is difficult to identify players by their account names. ChessBase 18 does this automatically. For example, you enter the club name in Lichess and the program helps to identify the next opponent by statistically comparing it with the reference database.
It already knew tactics, now comes strategy: The search mask now contains 30 strategic topics, from attack on the king; to space advantage; to the strong knight. The search results are sorted according to the importance of the topic for the game. For example, if you search for ‘strong pair of bishops’, the highest-ranked game has truly powerful bishops.
ChessBase 18 shows you how a player fares in different strategic situations, compared to the average. It also makes the games that led to this conclusion immediately available for replay.
Now there is feature-rich access to databases or opening preparations from your mobile phone: with the year of Premium included in ChessBase 18, you can use app.chessbase. com to access the online database, the cloud databases and your opening preparations saved in ‘My Moves’. On the way to the team match, you can quickly practise your own repertoire with the training function.
We have been familiar with cloud engines via Ducats for a long time. They fulfil the need for increased computing power and can save power usage while on the move. ChessBase 18 comes with a built-in remote engine, for which you can not only book powerful hardware in a German data centre at low cost, but also get a flat rate without paying Ducats on a smaller machine with a Premium account.
In the new program, the work is not only in the amazing functions, but also in countless technical detail improvements. The data format has been speeded up. Then there's the fresh new look with redesigned icons. Sharing games via QR code for the club magazine or printed training material is a practical contemporary feature. Even more contemporary are our experiments with the integration of ChatGPT, which can, for example, provide practical opening tips or player biographies.
Prices
ChessBase 18 Mega Package: €349.90
(includes Mega Database 2025, one year Mega update service, one year ChessBase Magazine, one year Premium ChessBase Account.)
ChessBase Premium Package: €499.90 (includes Mega Database 2025, one year Mega update service, Corresponence Database 2024, one year ChessBase Magazine, one year Premium ChessBase Account, 1000 Ducats for ChessBase Account.)
ChessBase 18 Update from CB 17 € 149.90
