Igowin

    Keywords: Software

Igowin is a 9x9 go program that uses a weak version of the 1998 engine from The Many Faces of Go. It's considered to be a nice, fairly easy introduction to Go.

You can get it free at David Fotland's page: [ext] http://www.smart-games.com/igowin.html.

Note that the difficulty levels indicated by Igowin are seriously overrated, so take them with a grain of salt.

See also:


Difficulty (no komi)

 Rank       Handicap    Igowin's colour
 ---------------------------------------
 25k-23k        5           White
 22k-20k        4           White
 19k-17k        3           White
 16k-13k        2           White
 12k-9k         0           White
 8k-5k          0           Black
 4k-1k          2           Black
 1d-3d          3           Black
 4d-6d          4           Black
 Professional   5           Black

Jasonred: A pretty unique thing about Igowin, IMHO, is its speed, responding to moves as soon as you place them. This is good and bad, in that it makes practice smooth and quick, no waiting for your opponent. On the other hand, this teaches some bad habits, like playing too quickly (in response to Igowin), thinking during your own hand, instead of while the opponent is thinking, and such. All in all though, I prefer Igowin, as it annoys me no end when a program takes like 2 minutes to block my peep during the endgame...


JanDeWit: It has the standard Way to Go tutorial, it plays only on 9x9 and you can only crank up the difficulty by getting better yourself (after studying a little bit I rocketed up from around 23kyu with 4/5 handicap to 12 kyu with no handicap, so I guess I'm getting better).

I actually like the fact that you can't undo moves, as this forces you to think and not just click somewhere in the hope that your move works out OK. Too bad I don't have the cash to buy the full version (yet?). I think this program is nice for beginners to practice their tactical skills.


Sometimes, Igowin cannot properly count territory

[Diagram]

Igowin at 5k; unknown marked territory

The marked points are considered dame by Igowin during the counting.

Igowin also doesn't recognise seki.

  • Not true - I've played games with it where seki was recognized. DrStraw

Dead or Alive?

[Diagram]

corner

It thinks the marked black group is dead (white's turn). What do you think?

Aloril: Its unconditionally alive, no matter what white does black can just pass and white still can't capture it.


year (7K): I've had igowin record death for itself in a similar shape. The second eye point was above it though rather than to the left. I think it must be looking at the white at the critical point in the four point nakade rather than the second eye.

Igowin does have a "dispute score" function, where you can continue to play through positions like this to convince it that you are right.

Bug in IGOWIN?

[Diagram]

Playing at Professional level


Every time I play the sequence above Igowin crashes as soon as I play 5. DrStraw

[Diagram]

Playing at Professional level


Here is another one. DrStraw

[Diagram]

Playing at Professional level


Another. Ma1ky?


Igowin was my introduction to go. I still fire it up often, even though TurboGo offers games on other boards. It's an incredible program, despite its bugs. It's very aestetically pleasing, too :)


High score:

What is your high score in this program. Mine is 2 Dan +0.50 with 4 Dan as the most common and 6 Dan as the best rank after only 188 games.

DrStraw This is probably not a very interesting question as it is easy to get lucky one time and get a high rank. More interesting would be the highest average rank attained after a sizable number of games, say 100. So you are saying that 188 is alot more than 100? I could play 12 games more, and then give you the average at 200 games. But that would still be around 2 Dan + 0.50.

Jugular: I've managed to find a new and difficult Igowin challenge (a sign of a boring job I reckon). See if you can get there quicker!

    Games Played: 16
    Average Rank: Professional
    Most Common: Professional
    Best Rank: Professional

It is not clear whether you are claiming that you achieved this or whether you are throwing it out as a challenge.
Bildstein: From memory, it doesn't start keeping averages until you lose a game (stops all those kyu games muddying the waters). So if you win all the way to pro and then lose, I suppose this would happen.

The above challenge can be beaten in 11 games at the quickest. This is possible through vicious bug exploitation, and thereby defeating the computer by nearly 100 points every game. The Bug: after Igowin tallies the score for a game, don't start a new game or dispute the score. Instead, click on the board. You can place pieces for BOTH sides, allowing you to set up a devastating loss for the computer. Click "pass" twice when you are done rigging the board to receive your new score. This bug exists in the Igowin demo (version 1.0), linked for download at the top of the page.

Bildstein: You don't necessarily have to use the bug. When you are playing a game in the kyu levels, you gain 5 ranks for killing all white stones (you don't get this when you're playing as a dan). You get two ranks if you win by 31 or more. So I suppose the best would be 25k, 20k, 15k, 10k, 5k, 3k, 1k, 5d, 6d, pro. Or 10 games. You could do this, perhaps if you were pro. But then perhaps you couldn't. Igowin is not reliably bad. By the way, sometimes when I get beaten back to 1k I try for an all out victory to get me back to 5d. When it works, it actually makes it worth losing that 1d game. It's hard, but I've managed it. I've even kept an sgf of such a game because I was proud :)

Anyway, about my 'high score', this morning, after 810 games, I managed to get my 'Most common rank' upp to 5d (from 2d). So here's my score, after 810 games which I think is enough to be meaningful:

 Games played:     810
 Average rank:     3 Dan +0.35
 Most common rank: 5 Dan (tied with 2 Dan)
 Best rank:        Professional

By the way, I also have Igowin crash on Pro sometimes. I think it's overtaxing itself - it usually thinks for a noticable amount of time first. Here's how I start on Pro and I have won many games this way (I win more often than not like this):

[Diagram]

Playing at Professional level


I cut off the lower right but Black invests in it and makes it big enough that when I capture it there's not much more to do to win. Sometimes I break in to the bottom left, sometimes the top right, and sometimes I invade the top left for six-stone, two point life.


This is a copy of the living page "Igowin" at Sensei's Library.
(OC) 2009 the Authors, published under the OpenContent License V1.0.
[Welcome to Sensei's Library!]
StartingPoints
ReferenceSection
About