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Arena by Martin Blume |
Ahh.... the game of kings! If you're interested in a good game of chess and would like to be able to do more than make moves, grab Arena! This chess interface matched with a good chess engine will give you hours of great play as well as the ability to view games and play chess online. |
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Download HERE |
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Arena by Martin Blume Arena is a 32 bit windows chess board interface that is combined with chess engines to make your playing experience masterful! Arena has lots of features and settings and comes with the ability to play internet chess online with many of the chess servers available on the internet. Plus lots, lots more. So break out the box of pieces, pick your color, set em up and lets get to our first lesson: Platform..... The two versions that I'm reviewing are running nicely on my XP Pro and Win 98. I really have yet to find the actual list of what is supported but I think it can be assumed that it will run on any win32 system. Web Site.......... The web site is full of information on Arena including a forum, FAQs, a link to readme texts, about the author and so on. The download page lists the different file possibilities including past versions! It is easy to read with fairly large fonts and equal colors. I did find the pages a bit crowded but with a program like this, I can see why. There's lots to see and do! Downloading........ Your
download depends on exactly what you are looking for. If you need
only the interface and have your own chess engines, then your
download will be a paltry 1.5 megs or so however, if your looking
for the big guns, complete with added extras and multiple engines
and pgn files attached, your looking at a whopping 12 megs. There
are other choices inbetween too and some nice additions. Take
your pick. Installation.......... Arena uses a standard installation engine, with some additions, to get you completely installed. First is the opening window, directory location, then you are given check boxes to select your installed components including which engines you want to use, move announcements, flags and national anthems (!), and a GM (grandmaster) database of games which is almost 9 megs in size. That's it. No rebooting is necessary and you're ready to go with a click of the desktop icon. As the program starts for the first time, you are asked to pick one of the 17 (!) different languages that Arena is able to utilize in it's interface. Help Files.......... Arena has no slim pickens when it comes to help. Inside the Arena program is a standard help file that gives you all of the proper information needed to get started with this great program. I did see few snaps of the interface but not many. The explanations are well written and easy to follow. Don't stop there for help though. Their web site has lots and lots of help including the previously mentioned FAQ's, Forum with posted questions current as of this writing (Feb. 2004), VERY easy to find contact addresses, and much more. Interface & Features ........... As far as I'm concerned, Arena has a great interface. The board size is adjustable in relation to the complete window size. There is the usual menu row at the top with a nice collection of icons just below that. These icons are used for different functions of the program such as new game, open file, save, adjust level, next/previous game, internet connecting and more. The window shows two chess clocks with the names of the opponents next to each one and if available, their countries flag. There is a window below this where the computer lists it's moves complete with tabs for different functions dealing with the game. There is also a table which will show the actual winning level that each move gives in bar graph format and below that, the opening sequence or 'book' type. At the bottom is the area where the chess engine is shown doing it's move calculations. This interface has the ability to accept 'skins' if your not fussy on what the installation layout looks like. These skins are really just zipped files with different graphics within which are manually inserted using the 'appearance' area of the options menu. Here's a pic of Arena's interface with a skin:
This interface not only has the ability to have skins applied, but there are many options that can be made to the appearance including board color, piece style and color, board size, applying graphics to the squares and more. Here's a couple of pics from the 'appearances' selection under the 'Options' menu item:
Arena uses 'chess engines' for it's operations, including the Winboard and UCI types. These are specific programs designed to play chess and to perform chess functions, but only in a text based operation. What Arena does is take these engines and utilize their features in an easy to view way so that just about everyone can enjoy them. There are lots of these engines available and many are free. For my 'small install' which doesn't come with an engine, I am using a freely distributed one that is called 'crafty' and is downloadable from HERE. I've played it before and find it very challenging to me. On my other machine with the full 11 meg install, it has two engines pre installed and ready to go. If you want to manage these things, there is an 'Engines' menu item where you can manage, install, and manipulate these things. Here's a pic of that menu window:
Your a seasoned player and you want choices? The tabbed window lists all of your installed chess engines and gives you many choices as to how they are configured, their information and how they play! Here's another pic of a different tab:
When you're ready to play, it may take you some time just to choose HOW to play. Arena comes with many ways to play a good game of chess. If you are into playing the new form of chess called 'Fisher or Random chess' (Mixed back row!) it's available on Arena! You can play the computer or have the computer play itself. You can even play a tournament against different engines! There's blitz chess, tournament chess, standard chess of 'x' number of moves in 'x' number of minutes, and more. Here's a pic of both the level adjustment window and my Arena interface again showing the 'Levels' menu exploded:
If it's tournament play you want, Arena will not disappoint when it comes to selections. This particular area loaded with settings. I'd get a typing cramp just trying to list them so instead, here's some pics of the 'Engines/Tournament' window so you can see just for yourself what exactly you can do with this aspect of Arena:
If you're looking for an online chess experience, Arena does an excellent job. It is pre installed with many of the most popular chess server locations including the Free Internet Chess Server (Fics), Chessclub.com, gics, icchess.net and more. Just change the setting to reflect your username and password, or logon as a guest, and you're on your way. The interface for chess online includes radio buttons for some of the most commonly used commands found in most chess servers. An extremely nice touch! Here's a few pics of the settings and also my online experience learning chess with the FICS 'lecturebot' as an example:
As far as features go, Arena doesn't stop there. With Arena you can view games listed in the standard .pgn, .epd and many other formats. This function is a simple as downloading a file full of games, finding it with the PGN/load menu function, and listing it. Here's a pic of one such file listing some of Bobby Fisher's greatest games:
You can use specific chess engines to analyze games, do speed tests, print games (including diagrams if included in the file!), opening books, and much, much more. In fact, I would suggest that if this review has bitten your chess bug even slightly, you should download and install this program along with at least one chess engine and start playing with it as I have actually only touched the surface reviewing this great program.
Uninstall...... This program uses the typical uninstall routine however, it does ask you if you want to save certain key files in case you are doing an upgrade. It will save these files for you if necessary, along with the directory for the program. Even on a full uninstall, you'll have to manually remove the remaining directory from your hard drive via your file manager. Problems...... Not yet! Mind you, I have only touched certain parts of this program as I am only a casual player and am not as 'hardcore' as many players are. Any problems encountered will most likely be answered by the forum that is available from the web site for Arena. I have not seen any mentioned anyway. In Closing .......... OK, so you don't really need all the fancy stuff, you just want to play a game of chess! That's ok, install Arena with an engine and make the first move, Arena will do the rest. And if you play the way I've been with this program, I wish you lots of luck! Now where DID that cat hide the rook! Enjoy!! Buzzy J |
