Re: Shusaku invincible
Posted: Tue Apr 28, 2015 3:37 pm
I believe that for anyone below 1-dan - and probably even dan-level - Invincible is definitely worth buying. I have the book and it has expanded my knowledge of Go considerably.Skitarg wrote:HelloIs it worth buying invincible?
Of course the style of Shûsaku Hon'inbô is somewhat outdated, but it still shows very good form, so IMO it is worth emulating. The difference in style between the Go of 1800s Japan and the Go of our times is not wildly different, even with the fuseki and joseki innovations of the past 150 years.
The kifu in Invincible are divided into several diagrams to make it easy for readers to follow the commentary. Most of them are 30 to 50 moves long. Some are only 20-30 moves long. Also, there are many uncommented games, showing only the relevant information and the kifu. If you want just to replay the games and skip the commentary, that's fine. For beginners it might be better simply to play through the games a few times before reading the commentary; it is easier to understand the commentary after having applied in one's own games some of the lessons exposed therein. Meanwhile you can expose your mind to what you see in Shûsaku's games and apply them when playing against your friends. It will take some time to master what is being applied, but this way you reinforce good playing habits and weed out bad ones. Which means that you will be able to make it to shodan slowly but surely. (18 months should be more than long enough to reach that goal, provided you play regularly.)
I wholeheartedly recommend buying the book and playing through all of the games therein. Of course, if you want to follow the games of current top pro Go players, it's better to replay games by players such as Yamashita Keigo, Park Yeong-hun, Chen Yaoye, or Gu Li. If you are a DDK or SDK and just want to get start getting good at Go, then Invincible is the book for you.