Ro's Recz

I had not played chess for a long time (at least 5 years), but after watching The Queen’s Gambit it made me want to play again. Chess is an exceptionally great game to play because it is all skill, and there is so much strategy in every move.

Recently, I have started to play chess on Chess.com. I chose this site to play on (as opposed to playing straight from the Mac version) because there are so many more options and features.

My personal favorite feature is the ability to play characters. The character that I really wanted to try playing is Beth Harmon, who is the main character in The Queen’s Gambit series. She is a chess prodigy, but you can play her at different stages of her life. You can choose to play the 8 year old version when she just started playing chess, all the way up to the the 22 year old version of Beth when she is the world champion. Chess rankings use a formula called the Elo Ratings, and each version of Beth that you play against has a higher Elo Rating than the last. It is really fun to see which version of her you can beat and then try to keep working your way up.

However, Chess.com is also a really useful site because there are plenty of other features. You can play real people in online matches, and you can even join tournaments through the website. Regardless of your skill level, you are bound to find people who you can have fun playing against. If you are like me and have started getting back into chess after watching The Queen’s Gambit, Chess.com is one of the best places to play!