Chess Pro Explains How to Spot Cheaters (ft. GothamChess) | WIRED

"Only a bot would play that!" Sacrificing a Queen in chess is a move you're much more likely to see a bot make as opposed to a human, as humans want to protect the game's most valuable piece. In the wake of the recent chess cheating scandal, Levy Rozman from GothamChess explains how you actually cheat at chess. Using artificial intelligence, see how people use everything from bathroom cell phones to ear pieces to try to skirt the rules and gain an edge.
Check out Levy's KZbin channel: / @gothamchess
Director: Lisandro Perez-Rey
Director of Photography: Charlie Jordan
Editor: Louville Moore
Talent: Levy Rozman
Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi
Associate Producer: Samantha Vélez
Production Manager: Eric Martinez
Production Coordinator: Fernando Davila
Camera Operator: Corey Eisenstein
Audio: Brett Van Deusen
Production Assistant: Patrick Sargent
Post Production Supervisor: Alexa Deutsch
Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant
Supervising Editor: Doug Larsen
Assistant Editor: Ben Harowitz
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[@GothamChess]

Thanks so much for having me, Wired! :)

[@havenless3551]

living legend

[@jexilus_]

Gotham i love you bro

[@poopenfarten]

WOOOOOOOOOOOOO

[@bananaman-nt5nb]

My man 💪

[@gffg387]

Thank you for having us.

[@TheSuperImmortalKing]

I sacrifice my queen all the time and nobody has accused me of being a bot. Just because I lose my game, doesn't mean I'm not cheating.

[@bellewjoshua7112]

Yea same here

[@mistermiggens5555]

yeah this seems very scripted. the queen sac example could have been found out by anybody over 1k

[@jermeyplunkett3744]

Definitely, i play chess to find opportunities to do moves like this sacrifice it's my main motivation to play finding the "impossible" moves More accurately "improbable" moves

[@milico2935]

He's refering to sacrifices that are not very obvious. If you see gms playing engines for example the way they sacrifice pieces is very different, and the engine might do it completely out of the blue for no immediately seen advantage just because it evaluates the position as better The example here was just very bad

[@kringle7804]

​@mistermiggens but you often don't see cheaters in those elo levels as much as you do in lower ones. Sure they do cheat but it's alot more obvious

[@lorddarthvader2215]

Me : " Blunders my Queen" Levy : He sacrificed the Queen. Only a bot can come up with that move.

[@rainchopper898]

He also said that no human has ever made a move like the sacrifice that he showcased. This is misleading. It was a bad example. Rest of his ideas were really informative

[@octobsession3061]

​@@rainchopper898Pin of shame. Dude, not everyone watching this video is high-rated chess nerd, like come on, any 1k would probably see mate in 3 or 4 occasionally, it's just an example he gave to wider range public, the sacrifice which are not so obvious.

[@case6189]

@@octobsession3061high rated chess nerd? On a chess website 1000 elo is practically still a beginner lmfao. The example sucked Levy talking out of his butt this is why he’s only good for teaching scrubs

[@Ruzzky_Bly4t]

@@rainchopper898 He said that no human has ever made that particular sequence of moves. Not any sequence resembling that one. Obviously, he knows that people make queen sacrifices sometimes.

[@yeetmaster9010]

@@rainchopper898 No, but said move is surrounded by so many other red flags.

[@cmd31220]

I just love how if you're called a bot in literally any other game, it means you're really bad. But in chess, it means you're amazing

[@arthurb6882]

in what games does it mean you're bad?

[@Rarezites]

​@@arthurb6882 For example, Minecraft, CoD, Fortnite, that stuff.

[@toxicteapot7941]

@@arthurb6882 league of legends, dota, and other mmos, you're being called bad if you are called a bot.

[@locrianphantom3547]

@Mark Berenger That’s the point…

[@NoryLevi]

Because in these game developers dont want to put a perfect bot in, AI in these games are designed to train players to be ready for iron or bronze gameplay. If you take a look at FIFA for example, the hardest difficulty (UT Ultimate) is like top 0.5% between players. Even in Dota, Open AI Five beat OG 2-0 after OG won back to back International

[@anirbanchakraborty1464]

Levy is so consistent that he has started posting on other channels too. Incredible

[@sabiiiir]

Your comment is funny bro👍

[@chauncyquest2779]

This one was less clickbaity though!

[@Reality9111]

I am routinely impressed by his dedication to posting content and always bringing the same energy in every video.

[@mikeymouse4629]

I think Levy's video above has some major flaws in the logic presented. Just because your opponent sacrificed all of his pieces and yet won doesn't necessarily mean they cheated... they could just be playing on 'another level'.

[@MultiTrace22]

LOL

[@risingscum1865]

One time I was playing against a guy and as I was about to checkmate he pulled out a comically large pawn and knocked down all my pieces and then told me I got pawned. I think he might have been cheating but idk, he said it was a hidden rule.

[@hughg.rection8567]

Lmaoooo

[@cheatlink11]

Grow your elo to grandmaster with this one weird trick!

[@alexepic3255]

Should had read the pawn's effects in the bottom of the card

[@dapperraptor8075]

Google en passant

[@LightPink]

When child my brother told me pawns can hop over other pieces and capture. I was amazed at this new rule and promptly lost that game.

[@kilorl.]

Levy in this video: "sacrificing pieces is something a human would never do, those moves are very bot-like" Levy on his main channel: THE ROOOOOOOOK

[@melonneleh]

Underrated 😂

[@ItzOndra]

This comment has only one reply, let me fix that.

[@Trashy2]

now 3 ;D

[@WritingTeacher-jw4ul]

NOW 4!

[@nxoryialzb]

now 5 ?

[@ultimamateria1604]

The first mate he used is actually a pretty common mating pattern, the sacrifice is nice but the double bishop mate is a bodens mate and ive practiced it a lot on lichess, i could totes see a player spotting that move

[@Buf037]

yeah the queen sacrifice wasn't super hard to find, it was more the fact that he had to sac his knight to even get to that point

[@nickdasher5501]

Yeah like it was a nice sequence and not the easiest to find, but it's not like an unsolvable puzzle. If you post that position on r/chess I bet a lot of people would figure it out. Strange to use that particular example

[@fennecbesixdouze1794]

Sacrificing the knight was completely intuitive, it opens up a completely devastating f-file on a vulnerable king with tempo.@@Buf037

[@properp6922]

totes? is the full word too much time? you just typed an essay and ended on a strange made up word just wondering?

[@Buf037]

@@properp6922 🤓

[@pauldraper1736]

The most suspicious moves are not sacrificial moves, but weird positional stuff. Like moving the queen back one space because 5 moves later it's gonna save you a tempo.

[@NathanHedglin]

Exactly this. Plenty of examples of queen sacrifices by humans. I saw one where the computer said to move a perfectly safe king. Made zero sense to a human that can't see 25 moved ahead.

[@jasonruff1270]

Yeah, I felt that example was a bit too simple,.

[@jasonruff1270]

Yeah I think he gave this example because it was simple and he was trying to cater to a mainstream audience

[@rcmag13]

Agreed. This video is misleading as any good chess player would sacrifice a queen if it led to a checkmate in 2 to 3 moves. Its the niche positional ones that are like, what the?

[@siltzi]

Absolutely, you can almost instantly tell if someone is cheating by those moves. Random king move in the middle of a game that seems to achieve nothing (happens in lower elo and very high elo tho sometimes), or those weird queen/bishop one tile moves when there seems to be more forward progessing moves available.

[@somerandomdudefes31]

That example felt more like a normal chess puzzle than a cheater scenario, but other than that, great video.

[@auzad3s601]

Well the point is that is very unlikely to see a so risky sacrifice sequence (there is the knight’s one also) in let’s say 10-12 sec, maybe Magnus, Hikaru and some others super GM could but…

[@shtuffs]

@@auzad3s601 no pretty much any competent player can figure out that mate pretty quickly. Humans are generally pretty good at attacking moves but it's usually the positional long termoves that they struggle more at. I think he used a bad example here

[@danelyn.1374]

exactly, thought this was a bit weird. I feel like Levy gave a more simplified explanation for this as there probably would be moves that are definitely a lot of tactics that might actually be suspicious, but probably was a lot harder to explain in an interview than a 3-move tactic plus I suppose he's mostly explaining cheaters at a low elo, probably

[@nmul8950]

@@shtuffsgood example explained poorly. the main point is that the opponent doesnt have to recapture, and u seemingly gain nothing by keeping ur queen in danger only defended by a flimsy tactic

[@Av-uv6xu]

Time control is very important here. Online chess, not classical. Carlsen said that he only need to get the hint when to look up for something to win majority of his games, so he would prob took his time and find this ez when someone said: now, but during the regular online which is usually blitz game, not really a chance to even search for something that crazy.

[@ultimatestuff7111]

0:09 does make some sense because it’s checkmate in only 2, however a human would probably sac the bishop instead of queen but I think it’s because psychologically an opponent is way more likely to take a queen than bishop

[@Zombie_MB]

I don’t think it was even than crazy of an idea. It’s not hard to spot that move. Maybe the engine getting him to the position to be able to do this is what was fishy? Idk.

[@ultimatestuff7111]

@@Zombie_MB it’s not but maybe the queen sac is not human, a human would sac the bishop

[@Taterzz]

@@ultimatestuff7111 why? the queen would have more power if the sacrifice didn't go through and easily take 3 pieces while also dogging on the king.

[@Victor_Gabriele]

​@@TaterzzBasically: The queen sacrifice is human, but the Knight sacrifice that led to this is unhuman

[@twainrocks4771]

I think most players over 1k elo are spotting a queen or bishop sacrifice mate

[@digital5535]

‘A human would never play that move’ Me who makes random moves: you have yet to reach my level

[@hyperthreaded]

I'm a chess noob, but it looks to me like Wired cut the recording of Levy's computer move analysis into random confusing bits and pieces for dramatic effect because they don't trust their viewers to concentrate and stay attentive for more than 20 seconds.

[@mysticseven6578]

If you'd like to see a video where Levy had the chance to explain in more detail, check out any of his chess cheating videos (try searching for "Gothamchess cheaters"). In those videos, he breaks down the games in funny but educational ways.

[@Trippze]

@@mysticseven6578 bro he obviously knows that he referred to him by his first name

[@mysticseven6578]

@@Trippze Fair point! I was more talking to new viewers, but apologies to Olaf if I came off as condescending.

[@doicaretho6851]

@@mysticseven6578 Don't apologize, that other guy is just being a jackass. There was no reason for him to say that. And thanks for the recommendation.

[@jean8252]

They think everyone has zoomer attention span

[@roottwo5459]

That was literally the most tame queen "sacrifice" ever. A human would absolutely play that move.

[@1c0nic_player]

they would have to be decent to find it still but yeah, its a bad example

[@paolosworld99]

Anyone who has messed around for 30mins in lichess puzzles would be able to find that mate in 2 easy.

[@anonymously94]

@@paolosworld99 It's not a mate in 2. Black doesn't have to capture the queen.

[@taleladar]

@@anonymously94 If black doesn't capture the queen, there's another followup move white can make that's instant checkmate. If white does other things to try to postpone or get out of that checkmate, their position suffers or they lose material.

[@anonymously94]

@@taleladar There is no immediate mate for white if black doesn't capture the queen, unless black makes a blunder.

[@SchadenfreudeUY]

0:54 3 huge questions 1. why does a treadmill have chess 2. why does it's chess contain a GM level AI 3. where can I get one

[@irrelevant_noob]

1. To incentivize the user while they're doing something incredibly monotonous... 2. Because why not? xD 3. Guess you could ask at the gym that Levy was talking about... Sadly, i don't know the details, but maybe they're somewhere on the internet.

[@robertzeurunkl8401]

Queen to D5 is actually a BRILLIANT move. It's Mate in 4.

[@robertzeurunkl8401]

0:20 - Ooops. I should have just waited.

[@danielyuan9862]

Yes, that's why Levy said it was a "non-human" move. Although, to be honest, that move is very human.

[@tth-2507]

​@@thedayofnewage That sacrifice will win the game - a reasonably good player (~1200ELO) will see and play that. Turned the video off after that.

[@patrickdervan3444]

@@tth-2507 If you watched the video, you'd see he wasn't just commenting on the queen's move but also on the moves leading up to that sacrifice

[@tth-2507]

@@patrickdervan3444 Then the intro of the video is cut very badly - further strengthening my believe that the video is not worth watching.

[@hexagonk9665]

As an AI, I can affirm his statements are indeed solid.

[@tayar3797]

Beeeeeep bop bleep boop beep

[@HoUrZ343]

@@SpeedyProduction Why'd you make 5 comments xd

[@YST187]

Like seriously lads, he is an AI

[@Robert-Italy]

Don't anthropomorphize the robots - they hate when you do that.

[@jahjoeka]

I like chat bots

[@maxkappert9795]

Tbh Levy explained it very well but the example could have been chosen better

[@MaxLennon]

A real example would probably have been like 10 moves long and the average audience member wouldn't have been able to follow, is my thinking.

[@samuelblackmon]

It's a decent example for low elo

[@TheCagedK]

@@MaxLennon the best explanation would be a endgame example when the chess ai unexplainably sacs a queen to get an extremely niche mate trap

[@resir9807]

I just don't get why black takes the queen. Like I get it's a noob but it's literally a 1 move calculation

[@jayadratha9836]

​@@resir9807 Black shouldn't take the queen, but the move is still very strong even if you don't "fall for it." Qd5 threatens the knight on c6. Move the knight and you lose the rook on a8 and you're dying on the back rank. The bishop can't defend the knight because the queen can take it if it goes to d7 and if it goes to b7 it stops defending e6. Qd5 is one of those moves that looks impossible at first glance, but once you see it is possible then it becomes crushing. It isn't an example of a "bot move" at higher levels, since it'd be easily findable by a good player, but if played quickly at low levels it'd certainly be suspicious.

[@pauld8379]

I had a great game recently, I won with a dubious checkmate. I used the computer analysis to see what the computer thought of my game. I had a 66% accuracy lol

[@ComradeChams]

May I ask why you shared this information with us, and do you consider it to be a rather high, or low accuracy?

[@pauld8379]

@@ComradeChams since then I had a 93% and a 96% once

[@BarSalad]

@@ComradeChamslate comment but the context is: sometimes you end a game feeling that you played great, then you look at the computer analysis afterwards and realize you made a bunch of mistakes. In terms of accuracy percentage, it really depends on the game (disparity between players, if someone makes a significant blunder, opening knowledge, etc) but being in the 60% range is not good

[@mghtutookhaung5449]

@@BarSalad its depends, I can score about 80+ accuracy against 1200s and win most games, but always score around 60~ against 1800s and lost most games. So you can't decide your play is good or bad by the accuracy alone.

[@BarSalad]

@@mghtutookhaung5449 that’s already covered in my comment

[@filyboy7]

levy has really become the go-to guy for all chess content catered to the general masses. being a long time chess fan myself, i never really liked levy's videos, but i respect the hustle, and him making it to the top.

[@brushtooth6636]

He definetly deserves this as well, pretty charismstic, a but controversial but entertaining

[@Nomazzz]

@@brushtooth6636 how is he controversial? Jusk askin started watching him just a few months ago

[@TheZombieSlayerWave]

he's ovbiously cheaper and less busy than the serious players.

[@falc0n12]

@@Nomazzz he’s not controversial at all, i have no idea what these people are saying

[@Nomazzz]

@@falc0n12 hahah that was my first reaction too

[@trampy6449]

Levy is just such a great chess player, both professionally and on stream and video. Congrats for getting onto wired!

[@rikittu]

Also a great chess explainer. Watched one of his videos randomly and it was very entertaining and informative. I know basically just a little more than the basics about chess and his video had me hooked.

[@Morphysince94]

great chess player? either you're patronizing af or I read dat wrong

[@ninous26]

Hes not a Grandmaster and he will never be one per his own admission. There are thousands of grandmasters

[@quintapusyt]

Yea I highly recommend checking him out if you haven't already!

[@Unpug]

Ikr

[@mrfake5251]

Levy has really come so far, I'm really proud of him.

[@gaelarturo2825]

Levy was holding the urge to scream THE QUEEN

[@pagp97]

To be honest, that Qd5 at the beginning is so majestic and not suspicious at all, the move itself does not mean cheating. The combination to get to that position though, may indicate otherwise

[@ranDOm9431]

In combination with the knight sacrifice, it was a very weird move. On its own it would’ve been fine.

[@bramvanduijn8086]

@@ranDOm9431The knight sacrifice makes perfect sense to me: It keeps pressure on the black king. Whenever you can control your opponent's king you should.

[@YtubeUserr]

@@bramvanduijn8086 afther the black King moves, both queen and knight are under attack. Qd5 move should have been calculated ahead of time for the knight sac to make sense. It's not just Qd5 or the knight sac, but the combination that leads to it's insane difficuty for a human

[@notmenotme614]

It’s interesting that when Gary Kasparov played Deep Blue, he thought IBM were cheating for the opposite reason… the computer suddenly changed its personality where it wouldn’t take predictable risks and cautiousness is a very human emotion. Gary tried to bait the computer but for some reason the computer wouldn’t take his piece. Imagine doing a move like the one in this video, when white goes to sacrifice their Queen and the black pawn just ignores it. He said it was the only computer (at the time) that wouldn’t take a high value piece when it could.

[@PBMS123]

Unless you can see literally 2 moves ahead and go, wel gee if i take the queen, I'm moving my pawn out of the way of that bishop, dun dun. Although, the queen being there can also take and then you have check again.

[@notmenotme614]

@@PBMS123 He described early computers as materialistic rather than thinking ahead . If they could take a high value piece, now, then they would. He also played a few games against the computer (maybe best of 5) and said the computers playing style or personality suddenly changed. If you haven’t seen it already, I highly recommend watching the documentary, I think it’s called “Game Over: Kasparov and the Machine”

[@Rsconquest]

@@notmenotme614 Early computers would overevaluate material after a long sequence. However, if they spot checkmate in a couple of moves after potentially taking a piece they just won't take.

[@hansmahr8627]

This is not what happened in the Deep Blue match. Kasparov didn't bait the computer to take one of his pieces. There were two instances in the second match Kasparov played against Deep Blue that Kasparov found suspicious. In the first instance, Deep Blue avoided a variation that would have allowed it to win two pawns. It wasn't the best variation but engines back then didn't have a very good evaluation system and valued material gains more highly than other factors because material is easy to calculate. The second and more famous instance was in the last game of the match. Kasparov played a dubious opening with the black pieces because he thought that Deep Blue wouldn't be able to accurately evaluate it. The opening was dubious because there was a well-known knight sacrifice for white that refuted the line. Engines back then didn't go for sacrifices unless they would immediately lead to a win so Kasparov was sure that Deep Blue wouldn't go for it. But it did and Kasparov lost the game. To this day Kasparov claims that this move was not played by Deep Blue but that a human chess player made the move. After all, the knight sacrifice was well-known among high-level chess players. However, the Deep Blue team claimed that they had entered this exact line into the opening book of Deep Blue before the game. That would be a huge coincidence but who knows.

[@whannabi]

@@hansmahr8627 and they did not even allow him a rematch...

[@larsf478]

To be fair, at 0:01 there is no safe square for the Queen... And you would only have tonlook 2 moves ahead. That move alone seems very reasonable to me.

[@telite7263]

My thought exactly. Finding a queen sacrifice resulting in mate in one doesn’t mean that they’re cheating. Granted, if they’re low ELO, it’s possible they could be, but I digress

[@YtubeUserr]

It's not just Qd5. The previous knight sac makes sense ONLY IF Qd5 has been seen/calculated ahead of time. Qd5 by itself is majestic enough, but combine it with the previous moves for the whole sequence to makes sense, IT"S INSANE for a human to find it.

[@GMFossAnderson]

0:22 personally i would of seen that. Am i a ROBOT?!?!

[@professionalyeeter]

Can you be sure you're not?

[@adwaawddw4730]

Someone asked Kasparov about this and I found his answer very interesting-he said that at the grandmaster level, all a cheater needs to know is that they have a winning move. This is a signal that only has to be done once-making it incredibly hard to detect-because at grandmaster level it only takes 1 major mistake or oversight to lose the game entirely.

[@AllTheArtsy]

Nakamura basically said the same thing in his podcast ep with Lex Fridman. Not even winning move but just a more advantageous move- just a signal so he will spend more time and find it. The explanation is fine, but the example given is for the non-players, for sure.

[@leventcelik6597]

Hikaru mentioned that you can cheat by simply relating a single beep. Beep means there's an important move to pay attention. If you know a move exists, you try hard to find it. No beep means the moves are not hard to find. You don't lose time.

[@AbhishekKumar-xx7li]

This is actually right. When you are solving a chess puzzles you try hard to spot the tactic but in normal games, most moves look simple and mundane.

[@rdr6269]

One beep for important defensive move, two beeps important offensive move, three beeps important move which is defensive but is also offensive. How about that?

[@TypicalAsian355]

Then the thing malfunctions and there’s never a beep

[@Thelaretus]

Coughing works too.

[@AbhishekKumar-xx7li]

@@rdr6269 Omg! You ppl now will make chess match happen in an enclosed cell.

[@bilbobaggins138]

That first move was a bad example. That was easy to spot

[@Ashlevon]

*sacrifices one or two pieces for a 3-turn play you've been planning for the past 4 turns* GothamChess: "That's an AI move right there, no doubt about it."

[@Bruh-bk6yo]

I love how Levy can be both serious and funny. Especially at GTE🤣

[@mrosskne]

what's GTE?

[@larisavela]

@@mrosskne GeT bitchEs

[@Bruh-bk6yo]

@@mrosskne Guess The Elo

[@bangeyboi2143]

Or how to lose at chess😂

[@EyeOfThePhi]

this guy looks racist af no cap

[@LeventButSpeedrunning]

That position was probably not the best example, but still understandable by every level of player. Nice job!

[@kaptenkrok8123]

I thought the same those moves are definately not beyond levys capabilities

[@aidancooper9498]

Paul Morphy would play like that for even less compensation, lol

[@tedros6917]

I feel like they edited it weird. even as a relative beginner, I've done puzzles that have used similar ideas so I think it's very likely even intermediate players would spot it

[@Trip_Fontaine]

Yeah, I'd be pretty uncomfortable playing anywhere that would deem me a cheater for making such moves. Those moves seem well within what even like an 1800-rated player could do, especially in slower time controls. I'm going through a tactics trainer intended for players around 1600 and some of the puzzles are not much easier than that. Of course, when you tell someone there is something to find like in a puzzle, it's easier than finding the same thing out of the blue in a real game.

[@utoherozv]

agreed! I don't think I would have found it, but it didn't look that crazy.

[@blademastedgaming5385]

Me: plays e5 Levy: a human would never play that

[@Hrishiraj2003]

Mikhail Tal: I didn't know I was a cheater my entire career.

[@TheWizardsOfOz]

"If it can go into your shoe, it can go to other places" - Levy Rozman, 2022

[@user-ok4ql8nw6q]

Levy: No human in history has ever played a sequence of moves like that. Mikhail Tal: Am I a joke to you?

[@cuberious1419]

9:27

[@48rhxR3agenT]

Bruh

[@kerimtezel5408]

or literally anyone who's over like 1700

[@szarekhthesilent2047]

Since when is Tal human?

[@Dyzz21]

Yeah that queen sac was mate in 1 how is that a bot move

[@megavirusuchiha5468]

THE ROOOOOOOOOOOOOK

[@kaibigan7084]

That knight and queen sacrifices are easier tricks than what i sometimes saw when i was young. Furhermore, that sacrifices are much easier to spot than most of chess puzzles solution that sometimes an amatuer can see!

[@heroclix0rz]

That queen gambit is really straight forward. It's mate in 2. I get that there are other queen sacs that only a computer would see, but I would expect anyone as good as Levy to see that particular example.

[@cheshire1]

Keep in mind that most of the people watching this channel aren't chess players. You can't really expect them to understand why the actual moves that GMs consider 'bot moves' are even good at all.

[@XCMasterchief]

that was my first thought too, but it's also contingent on Ng5+ being found first. It's a tough find but not unreasonable

[@adamwoolston253]

Definitely a believable human move, but real bot moves sac the queen the uncork some ten move combo that a general audience wouldn’t be able to follow lol. Also I’d say it depends on rating. A 500 finding a queen sac for mate in 2 is sus.

[@LauriKarjanlahti]

Im pretty sure that example was more about finding that knight sac. You know now that it works, but you dont normally simply even consider and calculate a move like that because moving a knight under attack when your own queen is already under one is very counter intuitive.

[@rcmag13]

@@LauriKarjanlahti I've done it before but I'm a very aggressive player. I think a lot of the moves were edited out as this example is pretty bad at best.

[@khoa4k266]

I would never think that gotham chess would get on wired

[@RamgateTV]

When someone sacrificing quenn for nothing or exchange for a pawn you might think first there is something or it was just a blunder.

[@amatya.rakshasa]

“Vibrating device” 🤣🤣🤣

[@Quintinity]

so kind of levy to bring attention to smaller channels, what a cool dude

[@deepuniverse4840]

smaller?

[@edpsussyfortniteamogus8373]

definitely not smaller

[@rebel2809]

yeah, how kind of him! maybe wired will be as big as levy some day

[@porygon-z8270]

@@edpsussyfortniteamogus8373 come back once you've learned what sarcasm is. Enjoy kindergarten!

[@edpsussyfortniteamogus8373]

@@porygon-z8270 be quiet dawg, reading text on a screen doesn’t as easily convey emotions or even sarcasm as easy as hearing it in person.

[@costelo_6297]

3:33 oh yes, The Vibrating Device. Yes, in the shoe, where else? Under armpit... oh

[@pavise6333]

Dewa Kipas having a seizure in the corner

[@Aleixus]

Btw just asking, are we allowed to have a visual representation of all the places the opponent can move/attack?

[@E_D___]

If someone moves his queen like that in a game your first thought would be "wtf is this??? Is it just a bait or am I dead already" When someone does this kind of move you know you are in a problem not because you think the enemy is cheating, but because you know your opponent had to have a reason to do this "idiotic " move

[@crabman2]

then just sacrifice your queen and hope they’re scared to take it lmao (they always take it hence why it works)

[@E_D___]

@@mhkk1491 I don't think you need to be a grandmaster to suspect a bait vs a blander. It depends on how much time is left (is he in a rush?), The playstyle your op had till that point, and how obvious it is. In this example the fact the queen can die is super obvious, so unless it was a missclick or op nearly put of time, it is probably a bait

[@GuidoHaverkort]

Unless you're 600 like me

[@sws212]

The example is literally just an oversimplified version of it for the audience. This is not actually a video for chess pros, dude. The real life example is them giving up their queen for a checkmate 4 or 5 moves away which not even most grandmasters can do.

[@aminulhussain2277]

@Richard L Probably just wired editing away the rest of the footage leaving only that single move for the initial example.

[@Loki1v9]

The first example is tragically bad imo I guess its fine not to give a new player that credit but the King is very obviously vulnerable and you only need to think 1 move ahead to conclude Queen sacrifice

[@finesseandstyle]

It's an exaggerated example that explains his point pretty well IMO. He then says that the bot does that but worse and pretty much at every turn.

[@Manakyn]

It may have been edited poorly by Wired (which they are known to do). Its possible his example was more in depth and they only kept the last part.

[@bleekcer]

@@Manakyn Yes, he talked about a sequence of moves, and Wired probably showed only the end.

[@JoshuaVance1124]

Yeah I’m almost sure they simplified it. Most likely gotham explained a longer sequence and they just showed the end, or he had a different example and wired vetoed it because it was too confusing. This is meant to be for people who don’t play chess so the example couldn’t be too complicated

[@Kauk77]

I think he or Eric Rosen has a video explaining that position and it is actually a very deep move because accepting the queen results in checkmate, but declining the queen isn't possible either without losing. Thing is, in that position you can decline the sacrifice in a variety of ways, and you have to find refutations for all of them. Not only you'd have to calculate a large number of possible lines but you would also have to have the confidence that you aren't wrong in any of them

[@rannithewitch3180]

i was training a specific queen gambit yesterday, my opponent followed all the moves I had in mind, I reacted super fast, and asked me if I was cheating lmao...he just saw later that I only had the advantage at beggining

[@OhBeEye]

That was a fantastic time. Thanks!

[@gnarls-OSRS]

The funny thing is, the move he actually criticized at the end for being too “bot-like” was just a really brilliant move; sacrificing the queen for checkmate with dual bishops. (Which I do NOT think is that hard to see honestly- and I’m terrible)

[@ZombieLincoln666]

I don’t see how bot-like doesn’t mean it isn’t brilliant

[@infomatters.]

3:48 he's barely holding his laugh 😂

[@chess]

Levy is an inspiration, great episode!

[@kidkid]

Levy is an inspiration, great episode!

[@jexilus_]

RATIO

[@andremarques1088]

Levy is an inspiration, great episode!

[@rememberwhen7271]

Levy is an inspiration, great episode!

[@acediadekay3793]

Levy is an inspiration, great episode!

[@Craxiss]

Even for the recognition *brian hacks online* gets, his skills is so underrated at least by most tech fans in general. I mean I get that there is stamina and all that involved in things like he does but being able to stand so far away and have the ability get the information needed with high speed as expected to hit it perfectly with a paddle just over the net is extremely impressive.

[@MaryJane-qx7pk]

Thanks *brian hacks online* for the remote access into target's complete phone activities

[@arthurb6882]

why bother paying for a bot to post an advert if it makes no sense? who wrote this?

[@Outcastsage9033]

@@arthurb6882 the most common bot advert is probably those fake investment ones where they pay a bunch of bots to have fake conversations

[@arthurb6882]

@@Outcastsage9033 who would even believe these adverts are real, they put the product name in bold lol, I see a lot of generic bot comments under songs like “[artist] is so good, he doesn’t use FAKE VIEWS like everyone else” and people fall for it

[@chilledoutgamer3232]

I would've done that queen sacrifice. I think anyone who's read a lot of classical games as well as modern would consider that. It's just about controlling areas and bringing pressure to bear to achieve goals, that whole area with the knight and 2 bishops was already well set up of the q move.

[@Mist_R]

Exactly. The position was very straight forward, bishops beaming the king

[@DoomBapBellic]

@@Mist_R so you both are confessing that you are cheaters?

[@HowDo_IKnowBruh]

@@DoomBapBellic so you're confessing yourself that you never played chess? me neither

[@DoomBapBellic]

[@twelvoe4205]

@@DoomBapBellic the move isnt actually that hard to find, i think wired edited it so only the last part of the explanation was shown

[@tomaslove9416]

gotham was once despised by a whole enraged nation and even received death threats just because he accused his opponent is cheating. turned out the opponent was in fact cheating lol. :))

[@garynico9872]

dewa kipas

[@shingofan]

Out of the loop here - what's the story here?

[@derryaryasaputra2629]

@@shingofan GothamChess accused an Indonesian player (Dewa_Kipas) for cheating and then his account is blocked, this enraged a lot of people in the country. Long story short, GothamChess was right. You should look it up it's an interesting story how an entire country was fooled and start sending death threat over a small thing

[@samuellinn]

@@derryaryasaputra2629 obviously accusing a person of a certain race of cheating meant the accuser is a racist! /s

[@godgodson1765]

The opposite happened to me.... Kingscrusher accused me of cheating on ICC and I got banned and received death threats.... but my account was reinstated after revealing my identity.... I made a rap song about him, but he had my public song removed, this one is unlisted kzbin.info/www/bejne/q6iWqKKuisd8eKc

[@thsand5032]

The opening example feels a bit weird, I think any slightly experienced player would see that the queen to D5 move is safe because an attempt to take the queen results in immediate checkmate, and an experienced opponent would see that taking the queen results in checkmate as well.The full version of it later does however feel completely absurd.

[@Skel_fgc]

Yeah agreed, that Queen move is pretty normal high level stuff, but that knight play? Not so much…

[@MrB10N1CLE]

I don't think the editor knows much about chess, hence the weird opening.

[@ZappninLLP]

Thanks for this very informative video. An AI analysis post chess game is like a drug test after an Olympic performance.

[@YoxiiPlz]

7:08 Bro thats so true 😂

[@Googlebot123]

"No Human In History Has Ever Played A Sequence Of Moves Like That" Mikhail Tal- Hold My Insane Queen Sacrifices

[@blaze556922]

With all due respect, elite players sacrifice their Queens for victory all the time. I agree with everything else you said but in that example it was only three moves. You admitted that Grandmasters regularly think that far ahead. Especially because in that scenario the other person playing would definitely take the bait 9/ 10 times.

[@ImGonnaOilYouUp]

Okay Dunning-Kruger

[@blaze556922]

@@ImGonnaOilYouUp I'm very smarty pants 🤓 thanks though simple one.

[@davidemirante9405]

@@blaze556922 In that case I don't feel what is mostly suspicious is the last queen move, but the whole sequence. Although I agree that while that move is unfindable 29 days a month for even high level common players, sequences like that, and honestly even more impressive ones, have been played throughout chess history by humans.

[@anandasatria7734]

Yeah, in that sequence looked like what Tal would play

[@danielturner1891]

@@ImGonnaOilYouUp that’s not Dunning-Kruger, an effect that has been ironically misused. I think Levy, while doing a great job explaining, could have explained this better. Grandmasters DO sacrifice. They also do things that look, to men as a bad chess player, just as crazy.

[@TIMEWALKDG22]

Good video though I don't find the last position particularly hard to grasp maybe it was simplified for people in the video to understand but if I see this position in "puzzle rush" I find this 100% since you win back the c6 knight after the discovered check. There was this famous chess youtuber I know who always says to check captures and checks on every move since they are forcing. I find this makes puzzle rush easy now you could argue you cant find this over the board but i would whites queen is trapped maybe it was a blitz or bullet game in time control but its in fact the only move that saves the queen it can't go anywhere else I guess maybe looking for bishop a3 or bishop d3 danger levels and saccing the bishop is more natural not sure since i already knew the solution.

[@Journey22405]

in Isolation that queen move is something you would see occasionally but in the sequence that led up to that move you can tell its a bot. a human could see a queen sac mate, a bot will definitely see the queen sac will see it 5 in advance so will make all the moves necessary to make that sac mate happen.

[@RGC_animation]

The example that was chosen doesn't make too much sense for experienced players is because that position is meant for beginners to get the general ideas of bots using weird moves to cheat. Sacrificing a Queen is way more counter intuitive for a beginner than maybe a weird positional move.

[@Justt_us]

This a thing that also popped into my mind whilst seeing the video. Thanks for pointing it out!

[@zitronenwasser]

Yes, this is a great point

[@RickyJC]

More people need to accept the notion of losing to improve and winning to know you did something right.

[@cubicinfinity2]

When I lose, the game was so bad that I don't want to look at the analysis. When I win, I'm more likely to analyze it because I can see what I did wrong and feel better about still winning.

[@-BeeboTheRobot-]

3:27 Or elsewhere...

[@infamusmaus6091]

0:12 Affirmative, each time I play against bots, both queens die before the tenth turn

[@unclewillibomb8683]

The first example was actually pretty easy to spot, you’re queen is being attacked so you’re looking for a square to escape to and naturally you would find d5 as the best move.

[@pypeapple]

It’s simplified to appeal and make sense to a broader audience. Someone like me who doesn’t know about more in-depth chess tactics won’t be able to follow along, but with a simple example like that, which is humanly possible to find, it makes more sense and helps get the point across

[@ElZedLoL]

This is something I for example look out for in every game cuz forced sequences initiated by sacrifice are so fun :P also this is a 2 move sequence so not too bad - king moves are more sus ^^

[@chessandmathguy]

Had to see Ng5 first tho

[@perfumefemur]

@@pypeapple thank you for explaining this. I thought no one else realized that 😭

[@Cowtymsmiesznego]

@@chessandmathguy Ng5 is the only move that keeps any advantage for white at all. Not hard to see at all.

[@michaeledmunds7056]

"I would consider a non human move something that breaks principles of chess entirely." 100 rated players: "Am I a bot...?"

[@zanshibumi]

Fantastic interview.

[@justaguywholistentomusics]

imagine competing a player that play chess good and you accused him of cheating

[@blueskull7898]

It would be weird seeing it live at first, but I don’t feel 8:58 is really a sign of cheating, since checkmate is literally only in one move after

[@DireBowser]

Wired edits the videos weird, it was probably a much more in depth explaination.

[@ADollarMight]

it’s the sequence more so than that one move. in that position even i might be able to find that move but you have to hang the knight and queen first with no guarantee you even have a winning attack. Unless your Magnus Carlson you don’t find that, anyone under super grandmaster probably doesn’t even consider it

[@csarmii]

@@ADollarMight that's not true at all. A 2000 player with good tactics skills will find sequences like that.

[@ADollarMight]

@@csarmii not that sequence like levy says. You really don’t have any guarantees that that moves plays out unless you’re looking really far ahead like a super grandmaster and even they can miss stuff like that.

[@csarmii]

@@ADollarMight sure, the actual sequence is a bit longer, but no, it's not that big of a deal at all. And Magnus is not considered very good at tactics (not one of his strength) so he's not a good example on who would or would not find such a move. You don't have to be anywhere near a grandmaster, let alone super grandmaster for this.

[@mysteriousstranger6857]

I can definitely see a human playing the first move. It looks ridiculous at first, but when you look closely it's really not all that bizzare. It leads to a pretty obvious checkmate if taken (as demonstrated) and puts pressure on the knight at b6. The only recourse black has is to sacrafice bishop which completely destroys any defensibility the king's position had.

[@Ryuzakku]

On that first one, it makes sense if you have the time of classic chess to look at the board. Sacrificing a Queen to ensure checkmate. Doing that in bullet or blitz though? Yeah, likely a cheater. Sacrificing the knight is much more of a cheater move though on that one.

[@caseyford3368]

It's luring people in step by step. The more steps you can manage within your mind, the more often you can win.

[@SylvieTheCuteSylveon]

4:04 Ayo bout to head to my chess tournament with vibrating beads up my a-

[@nathanapplegate5374]

The queen sacrifice is actually a very elegant positional play. I’ve done moves like that before. Yes, they are gambles. I’ve lost many times doing moves like that. But when it pays off, it pays off big and your opponent never saw it coming.

[@heitorfernandes703]

@@violentcabbage9424 no, he is only if he does it consistently, with high accuracy, throughout lots of games and winning near them all. Nathan probably don't have that, so no algorithm or Levy will think he is cheating.

[@thinboxdictator6720]

@Violent Cabbage levy was wrong before and this video is good example of it.

[@connarkent282]

@@violentcabbage9424 i saw that and like what. A human will sacrifice a Queen 😆

[@boogersincoffee]

Agreed, I got his point but it was not the greatest example.

[@HazopGaze]

It sounds sort of like my general thought process. Not even related to Chess in most cases, seeing as I play only rarely and I'm a novice to boot. In other games where I am thinking strategy, sometimes even ones where I have to make very quick decisions, I often consider risky yet powerful positions because I enjoy being able to blindside an opponent, sometimes with absurd multiplayer tactics that trade 'force' - like how many people are actively able to fight a battle - with knowledge. In a team game, having a little foresight can absolutely make up for being outnumbered. Even better if a team can position themselves well and force engagements that favor them, leading to unbreakable defenses and unstoppable offenses.

[@ShadowStrikeGaming-xx1go]

Me: sees this brilliant move by sacrificing a queen Levy: CHEATER

[@pinruihuang8463]

TBH I might find Qd5 if i'm lucky and it's a long time control. Those are *strong* bishops.

[@nellieb6585]

Omg I couldn’t be more proud of Levy, he’s come so far 🥺

[@arthurmarcil6787]

8:02 Well I guess I am a Bot. I just sacrificed The King to save a pawn.

[@IshowSongNames]

💀

[@robonator2945]

9:25 isn't a move like that exactly what happened in the famous Bent Larsen vs Tigran V Petrosian game? I'm not even into chess but I've heard of that as a super famous sacrifice so, unless there is something about that that I don't know about, yeah. (and yes I did have to look up their names, obviously I'm not claiming that I'm both A : not knowledgeable on chess and B : knew both of those names by heart.)

[@LyricallyWine626]

The first 10 seconds of this vid finally made clear to me why my father constantly gets accused of cheating when he plays online… If you think only a bot would sacrifice a Queen for a checkmate, then you simply haven’t met my father around the Washington Square Park in NYC yet. Baiting people with high value pieces into a mate that they never seem to see, using less valuable pieces is literally his whole MO, I shyt you not…

[@PervySage13]

I remember sacrificing my queen to get a checkmate on my dad when I was a kid. He had a knight in the way of a checkmate with my rook and I didn't need my queen for it. Well.....didn't need the queen for the final move but she was a useful sacrifice to get him to move his knight. I knew he wouldn't resist lmao.

[@pat9353]

9:27 I wouldn’t say no human. Hikarus immortal game had multiple queen sacrifices. Granted it’s one of his best games for a reason.

[@puffhell8051]

imagine using stockfish so much that you adapt to their playstyle and become the "Stockfish"

[@Ziel..]

"Vibrating device" speaks for itself 💀

[@tybera1114]

That move at the end is definitely a Waitzkin move, his pawn game was pretty crazy, and he often traded down material for positioning. While not common, there are players that do play games like that.

[@tominieminen66]

The example was too simplified, probably to make it easier to understand

[@lamregina1697]

​@@tominieminen66he said "no human in history has ever played a sequence of moves like that. "😅

[@ryanbahnsen6429]

9:26 I'm not sure that hikaru, Magnus or other chess GM can't see a queen sac leading to a forced win 5 moves ahead.

[@d_andrews]

There is no forced win unless the opponent captures the Queen. Yes it's clear that the opponent can't take the Queen immediately, but even knowing that that square is safe for now still doesn't justify leaving the Queen somewhere with so much potential danger for so little compensation, not without a lot of time on the clock.

[@Cowtymsmiesznego]

I sent that example to a friend who's 2200 FIDE and he found the win in 2 minutes. Terrible "proof" of cheating, in my opinion.

[@Modie]

@@d_andrews I think you are missing the main point here. Your queen was attacked. So moving it to a square where it can't be taken is what you should logically do. And if you can find a square that still attacks other pieces (in this case the knight), it even gives you tempo. The opponent can't even move the knight here, because then the rook hangs. Point is, even if your opponent spots the trap, you are winning a minor piece here. An advantage only one move away. Which shouldn't be hard to spot for higher level players.

[@d_andrews]

@@Modie you're not winning a minor piece though, because you sacrificed a Knight to get to this position. The point is that you have to have calculated all this at the time of sacrificing the Knight and been confident that it's good compensation.

[@Modie]

@@d_andrews Even if you sacrificed the knight (which was already shown in the video that it's not good to take), you win at least one pawn, your queen is out of danger, your rook has an open file AND the opponent has to deal with check (which also leads to them blocking their own rook). Kind of a better position than if you would retreat your queen. And you only need to calculate three moves ahead to see that.

[@unvergebeneid]

Watching Levy absolutely losing it over some insane engine move over on his channel is my favorite thing rn 😄

[@Greenlion781]

That's a terrible example at the beginning, a human being absolutely can find that queen sacrifice even in a blitz game. The two bishops raking toward the king in that way makes a human being always on the look for tricks like that.

[@hulkslayer626]

I think it said that that was the ending of a progression of sacrifices in a 6 or 7 move sequence.

[@ugrasergun]

Tell me you haven't watched the video without telling me you haven't watched the video.

[@charlespictet3046]

yea there must be more to it bc I watched the first 30 seconds and I couldn't believe that there was a bot accusation. If that's the ending of a several move progression then it makes more sense. I will find out by watching more of the video :)@@ugrasergun

[@ChickinSammich]

Me, at 8:26: Hm. Queen to C1 makes the most sense to me. Him, at 8:30: That exact move. Me: Yay, I'm a human!

[@ASMRChess]

Great video and Levy is great as usual but that position you chose as an example was pretty poor in my opinion. The checks are pretty forcing and white has an aggressive looking position so those moves are obviously worth investigating and as soon as you see the checkmate pattern you’ll analyze it further to see if you can force it. Anyways great job and very nice to see chess getting a bit of the clout it deserves.

[@Cowtymsmiesznego]

Yeah, he made an ok point and then gave a terrible example. This kind of nonsense is why you have people accusing each other of cheating all the time online. Those moves were neither engine moves, nor hard to find for a (decently skilled) human.

[@sinekonata]

8:52 It's really hard to believe that no GM can see that mate in 4. I mean aren't there puzzles training humans to see these tactics? 2-3 moves ahead seems very very near sighted. Is there somewhere I can read more about this?

[@asiamies9153]

It's a completely different ball game when someone tells you a winning tactic exists.

[@sinekonata]

@@asiamies9153 Still hard to believe but good point.

[@asiamies9153]

@@sinekonata It's a few move checkmate if the opponent plays the bad move after the first queen sac. There were two back to back queen sacs, and the opponent (an international master) did not see them coming

[@joseandresochoaroa4520]

I used to be 1900 ELO when I was younger, now probably after so many years I'm 1300-1500 but even for me, the move Ng5 was one of the best moves in the position, if night taken I could take a lot of material threatening mate, if not, the sacrifice of the queen was also one instant move I saw. I think they are better examples of how cheaters sometimes move a pawn 15 moves before they even put a espectacular move coordinated with the pawn, even +1900 can't see 15 moves ahead unless they are spectacular players and I mean almost all GM CANNOT SEE 10 COMPLEX SEQUENCES AHEAD, of course we can see easy sequences but not like that. That's a better example of cheating 'cause these ones cause a little to much fear in new players, and most of plataforms are good at taking down cheaters.

[@o.v4069]

🧢

[@ultimativePwnage]

4:33 this has to be the dumbest chess stockfootage ever. Look at it. LOOK AT IT. WHAT ARE THEY EVEN DOING.

[@matthaeusrex5627]

😂😂😂

[@emperorsascharoni9577]

Cheaters will often play the best engine move and if one move is +1 but the another move is also +1 or +0.9 (according to engine) often the engine move leads to a line that requires meticulous calculation and no mistakes to result in that +1 while the other move that might be slightly worse is way easier to see so when the enemy often plays these unexpectedly good moves where you think “how does he see this?” the enemy is either way better than you or cheating.

[@dD-ft1td]

The funny thing is they think it hides the fact there cheating. It’s like playing a couple bad moves then destroying them a few moves later

[@psychoticmortacarn]

We call them "opponents" my guy 😬

[@samidtaek_]

They didn't include Hikaru looking at Stockfish on the ceiling

[@arwalovele]

I would say one thing though, my partner for an example is notorious in sacrificing his pieces. He would see it as a trade and so although it may be that humans are risk averse, it is possible that some people WOULD make that risk.