Back then, there wasn’t Komi. Is it still advisable to replay old games? Given now josekis are starting to change accordingly to the advancement of the ai.

There's sufficient knowledge embedded in pro games of any era that would satisfy 99%+ of the population, IMO.

Ok that’s good to know. Thanks!

I agree with Ed, maybe even 99.9% of the go playing population should not care about the technical difference in terms of lack of komi.
I guess the only people who should care for a good reason are definitely the kids who train to become pro, and also top tier amateurs (semi-pro).

Besides the technical aspect, there is also a very important cultural aspect though: to me, the old games have lots of flavor to them because of the stories surrounding them; many old games come with such stories, such as the castle games in Japan with the stories about the different go schools competing with each other; or Go Seigen's best-of-10 series captured in several of John Fairbairn's wonderful books,
I haven't heard such stories in connection with the current pros' games - the only interesting ones are around the AlphaGo games - maybe also because there are so many tournaments and therefore tons of new games every month.

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Sorin - 361points.com

I'm not 100% sure, but I feel fairly confident that even today Insei and others studying to become professionals study games of Shusaku, Dosaku, Huang Longshi, Shi Xiangxia... The last two didn't even have fuseki (cross star point opening) like we know it, but it still doesn't mean you can't learn a whole lot from it.

Komi, fuseki... changes how a particular side (or both, in like sunjang Baduk) has to play, but it doesn't take away brilliant Tesuji, whole board thinking, tewari, L&D, reading skills...

Maybe it's more common in Japan (e.g. Kobayashi Koichi is said to have studied Shusaku's collection many times), but not in Korea. I asked pro Ko Joyeon (born 1989) about this a few years ago and she said she'd never studied Shusaku-era games. And not even famous more recent Japanese names like Sakata, Shuko, Cho, Kobayashi etc who are the bread-and-butter of older go fans on this forum via Go World. It was just 1990s onwards like Lee Changho she studied, when Korea rose to the top. When I was in BIBA On Sojin 7p did study Go Seigen's games (this is as an adult pro once he's made it, dunno what he did as a kid when training as insei/young pro).

My experience from being an insei in Japan, and also from what I heard about the other Asian countries, is very consistent with Uberdude's description.

Basically, insei are kids that not only have to go to regular school and do regular homework, but also study Go; they have no time or interest in old game records, since their main focus is to beat the other inseis, so it makes sense that they make best use of their limited study time and only focus on recent games.

Pros are very different, they have lots of free time and can choose what to study, I guess it's much more case-by-case there. Although I get the feeling that lower ranked pros would be more in "insei mode" and play catch-up with others and still focus mostly on modern games, and mostly top pros tend to look at historical games in search of inspiration.

Ian, your knowledge of the history of Go is definitely better than 99.99% compared to insei, and maybe better than 99% of pros

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Sorin - 361points.com

That's kind of you to say (though I doubt it!), but it's not so extensive. Mostly my knowledge of Go history comes from books like 400 years of Go in Japan, Invincible, Games of Wonder, Go Player's Almanac.

Though it is true that Go history interests me a whole lot, just as much or perhaps even greater than playing myself. My main motivation for getting stronger is actually to understand Pro Games better, and more specifically games by Dosaku, Doteki, Shusaku, Shi Xiangxia, Shuei...
I wish there were more English books on Go history, though, they're hard to come by. Let me know if you know good ones

I love "400 years of Go in Japan", it is a wonderful book about the history of Go. And of course "Invincible" is a classic, both for the history bits and for studying Shusaku's commented games. You read twice as many Go history books than I did - I don't have the other two you mentioned.

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Sorin - 361points.com

400 years and Invincible are real gems, I really love both those books!
Go Player's Almanac is full of interesting things, worth a read.
Games of Wonder isn't really a history book, it's just a game record collection, but of all these ancient Chinese games. So these games always make me look up some additional information about it players and they feel nice to replay because they're very different from modern Go.

Alternatively, I also highly recommend (you probably read it) The Treasure Chest Enigma.
Other interesting English books in the same genre are: Magic on the First Line, Go as Communication, The Journey in Search of the Origins of Go and the Go Companion (John Fairbairn)

At the moment the two players that interest me most (excluding Shusaku - but I'm going through Invincible right now) are Doteki and Shuei. There isn't a lot of information on these players out there, nor are their game records easy to find.

Takemiya is another one whose games I'd love to study, but I dislike studying through the computer, so I'm hoping to find more of his game records in some kind of book or something.

Some books on Takemiya:

Master Play - The Style of Takemiya (Yuan Zhou)

Le Go Cosmique (translated in French from the Japanese, if French books are convenient for you).

I haven't read them, so I don't know how good they are.

Tournament Go 1992 has some Takemiya games, though it's mostly Kobayashi Koichi as he was in a lot of title matches that year.

I second the idea that amateur level play results in such heavy flip-flops of the score that komi doesn't really matter.

That's why I always prefer White in komi games. It's basically a free bonus in case the game doesn't end in disaster

Yes but one could argue that the probability of disaster is slightly higher for White.



I suggest a slight tangent: get The Power of the Star Point (https://www.amazon.com/Power-Star-Point ... star+point). Many Takemiya concepts, and presented well.

I think that you meant to say "komi really matters," right? Else, why would you prefer White.

Can anyone tell me where I can purchase a copy of 400 Years of Go in Japan?

I've learned (with your Ing stones post) that vendors don't always update their websites, but it says there are three copies in stock here:
https://www.schaakengo.nl/goshop-keima/ ... anguage=en

It's not easy to play consistently...

Cheers,
Vesa