Option to reanalyse important historical game with latest Stockfish engine

Hi all

I noticed the following very important historical game:



which indicates in the analysis right now about 17.Qb3 being an inaccuracy

Not sure it is:

17: Wilhelm Steinitz - Adolf Anderssen 1-0 7.1, Vienna Vienna AUH 1873
rr4k1/pb1R1ppp/8/2p3q1/Q3p3/2N1P3/PP3PPP/2R3K1 w - - 0 1

Analysis by Stockfish 16 - one thread version:

1. +- (4.30): 17.Qb3 c4 18.Qxc4 Qg6 19.h3 Qe6 20.Qxe6 fxe6 21.Rcd1 a5 22.Rc7 Bd5 23.Nxd5 exd5 24.Rxd5 Rxb2 25.Rdd7 Rxa2 26.Rxg7+ Kh8 27.Rxh7+ Kg8 28.Rcg7+ Kf8
2. +- (3.97): 17.Rcd1 h6 18.Rc7 Qe5 19.Qd7 Ba6 20.Qxf7+ Kh8 21.Re7 Bc4 22.Qf8+ Rxf8 23.Rxe5 Rab8 24.Rd2 Rbd8 25.Rxd8 Rxd8 26.Rxc5 Bxa2 27.Ra5 Bb1 28.Rxa7 Rd2 29.h3 Rxb2 30.Ra4 Bd3 31.Rd4 Kh7 32.Nxe4
3. +- (2.94): 17.Qc4 Qf5 18.Rc7 a5 19.Rxc5 Rc8 20.Rc7 Rxc7 21.Qxc7 Qc8 22.Qe7 Bd5 23.Qe5 Be6 24.Qxe4 Rb8 25.b3 Qc5 26.h3 h6 27.Ne2 Qa3 28.Rc2 a4 29.Qxa4 Qxa4 30.bxa4 Ra8 31.Nd4 Bd7 32.Rc7 Bxa4 33.Rc5
4. +- (2.93): 17.Rc7 Qd8 18.Rxc5 Qb6 19.Rb5 Qc7 20.Ne2 Qd6 21.Rd1 Qc7 22.h3 Rc8 23.Qa5 Qxa5 24.Rxa5 a6 25.Rd2 g6 26.g4 Rd8 27.Rxd8+ Rxd8 28.Nd4
5. +- (2.83): 17.h3 Bc8 18.Rd5 Qe7 19.Qa3 Be6 20.Rxc5 Rd8 21.Nb5 Bd7 22.Nc7 Rab8 23.Nd5 Qf8 24.Nf4 a5 25.Rd1 a4 26.Rcd5 Bb5 27.Rxd8 Rxd8 28.Rxd8 Qxd8 29.Qc5 Bd3 30.b3
6. +- (2.74): 17.b3 a5 18.Qc4 Qf5 19.Rc7 Ba6 20.Qxe4 Qxe4 21.Nxe4 c4 22.bxc4 a4 23.a3 Rb3 24.Nc5 Rxa3 25.Nxa6 h5 26.Nc5 Ra2 27.Ne4 Rb2 28.Ra1 a3 29.h3 Rc2 30.c5 a2 31.Kh2
White is clearly winning

(Gavriel, 20.05.2024)

The game had been imported by "Imported by GEN1US" but doesn't show when.

I wonder if the date of import could be shown, and maybe if it was more than a year ago, an option to "update analysis" could be offered to make use of the latest Stockfish updates the site is usually following.

It was actually a very important game in question - for the evolution of chess style Steinitz was ushering in a new era of "modern positional chess", and learned lessons against Anderssen from Baden-Baden 1870 where he lost twice to him.

Anyway, given best analysis engine, it shows actually even in 1873, Steinitz was able to play a near perfect game for human standards of perfection.

I think there is a problem with the design of Fishnet. I've seen analyses of games that show the SF eval for depth 15 for a position that has a cloud eval with depth 30+. However, I don't think the cloud stores the variations, so the best line can't be shown in the analysis.

Perhaps a redesign to bring these two amazing features into alignment is warranted. I also understand why one would want to keep them decoupled.

It's a tough sell.

I'm afraid using cloud evalulation values where available would bring more inconsistencies. Even now there are some spurious "blunders" e.g. because the analysis cannot see a forced checkmate after one move but can see it after next (but when you check with sufficient depth, it turns out that the move marked as "blunder" does not in fact make the forced checkmate sequence any shorter). Evaluating each move with a (possibly very) different depth and (possibly) different engine version would IMHO make this happen much more often.

On the other hand, the feature of running local engine with chosen depth to a study chapter and saving the results would sometimes come handy.

That is one hell of an interesting game, and more importantly, it was played in 1873! Such positional strategies were likely unheard of back then. Moves like 19. h4 and 25. Nd1 are just world-class, especially Nd1. During those times, all they cared about was attacking the king and tempo, so a move like this would have been seen as a waste of time. Steinitz was clearly ahead of his time here. I'm pretty sure Anderssen was shocked by what he was witnessing, probably wondering, 'What the hell is this?'" i think he was shocked by this alien strategies like how the world was shocked by Alpha zero in 2018.

Also, I think this is the second time Kingscrusher has written a post about this issue if i am not mistaken and it hasn't been addressed yet.

@FearNoseAll said in #4:
> , so a move like this would have been seen as a waste of time. Steinitz was clearly ahead of his time here. I'm pretty sure Anderssen was shocked by what he was witnessing, probably wondering, 'What the hell is this?'" i think he was shocked by this alien strategies like how the world was shocked by Alpha zero in 2018.
>
> Also, I think this is the second time Kingscrusher has written a post about this issue if i am not mistaken and it hasn't been addressed yet.

To be fair, when black played Ne4 (a "blunder") it made it easier for White to have strong clinical moves. But there is in Steinitz a human bias reduction for attacking the King early and building the game in the opening without any dodgy gambits. I think it seems in Baden Baden 1870 he was annoyed about his losses to Anderssen and the other two losses and perhaps reassessed his chess to be less biased towards King attacks. So Steinitz not only tried to fix his own personal chess weaknesses but ended up influencing chess generally because he was also a chess writer and was in a position to that - control of media as well as concrete brilliant results in matches and tournaments.

Of course this "scientific style of play" doesn't apply to Lichess fun blitz games (non swiss format) because checkmating quickly does make for quick points and a higher chance of the podium. I feel this bias removal for non-gambit stuff is more relevant for one day chess.

It just so happens the game is super-accurate as if weirdly like a Super GM could have played it. But it was the Ne4 blunder making this possible.