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by k1kingy 543 days ago
This is a big reason why some of the top GMs (Magnus Carlsen in particular) aren't super interested in playing classical chess anymore.

It's at the point now where a reasonably good GM can learn and memorize a set of openings and more often than not draw the game against the top players. So in order to not lose games or rating points the game is played relatively conservative, rather than trying to push for a win.

Magnus and others are now trying to hype up freestyle chess (Fischer Random/Chess960) in order to take away the standard openings in order to avoid this memorization game and instead go back to the days where you're forced to calculate over the board.

1 comments

Yes indeed. I have played Fischer Random myself and I find it a nicer game to play than traditional chess at times, especially with beginners who don't know much about openings.