I want to read books that have weiqi (go) as a major focus. I know of Kawabata's book. Anything else? Also would take books teaching how to play for beginners.And what are everyone's thoughts on weiqi (go)? I've heard there's an elegance to it that even chess can't compare with. Is that true? Do you think this is something inherent in Chinese culture? Kind of how like our (Western) culture was only focused on war and fighting which gave birth to chess.
>>24823495Give up now, anon. Go isn’t even popular or well known in Asia, let alone in the rest of the world. You’ll never find people to play with.But yes, it is a very deep and interesting game.
>>24823495If you don't mind webnovel slop https://www.novelupdates.com/series/i-really-didnt-mean-to-play-go/
>>24823495Wasn’t chess born in india
>>24823512Nah you are
>>24823495there's the oulipo book
>>24823495>I've heard there's an elegance to it that even chess can't compare with. Is that true? Yes, with Go it feels like you're mapping out something or creating an abstract piece of art with another person. With chess it feels like a boxing match or other sport where you just want to dominate and win.>Do you think this is something inherent in Chinese culture?I have no idea. I honestly thought it was Japanese.
I tried to learn it online a while ago, but there are so many obscure rules that seem to exist just for "I get to rape you now, but you can't do the same to me" I gave up unable to beat even the fucking bot
>>24823619>so many obscure rulesKo is one rule. Maybe stick to tic-tac-toe
>>24823495I advise you to find people to play with if you want to cultivate it; you might be lucky and have something at your place, check baduk.club and your national Go association.Read the "Elementary Go Series" from Kiseido and "Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go". That'll take you a while on its own.Practice life & death problems with Cho Chikun's problem sets.Foxwq and Tygem are respectively the main Chinese and Korean servers, I think online-go is the main Western one.You can look up material on EGF (European Go Federation) and AGA (American Go Association) websites.>>24823619you must be confused with some other game.
>>24823495> I've heard there's an elegance to it that even chess can't compare withToo ambiguous, elaborate.
>>24823681There are more spots to put your pieces, without as many restrictions regarding placement, opening quadrillions more possible plays than chess, so games will last hours, potentially days, and this is somehow "elegant" and not just fucking tedious
It's a wonderful game, but you'll find it very difficult to find anyone to play against outside major metropolitan cities. There are four or so places online you can play on, each with its own sort of target skill range.I paid for a couple simple beginner's courses online, got me up to speed on the basics. Outside actual books, you'll want to at least take advantage of https://senseis.xmp.net/ and some Tsumego practice sites and stuff for Joseki. You'll find some basic resources on /reddit/ as well: https://www.reddit.com/r/baduk/wiki/faq#wiki_resources
>>24823495As the other guy said, it's not even popular in Asia. It's dying/dead in China, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan. I even watched a recent Cdramas where they just put the stone in random for all of their scenes. There are a lot of shadiness with their associations too. Think FIDE's corruption and Russian government interference in chess world. Best book for beginners are the Korean kids books. Either Baduktopia's Level Up series (out-of-print) or Speed Baduk.Btw go players don't tend to scan their books for sharing. And a lot of the books are basically very limited prints. For fiction, there's obviously First Kyu novel.The game tends to attract arrogant mentally-ill people like Robert Jasiek, Wildberger, and many more. I don't recommend talking to go players online and offline. I honestly recommend picking up chess. Don't be a weirdo.
>>24823495The Learn to Play Go series helped me understand a lot about the game but its from the 90s and some of the info in there is misleading in a post AI-revolution game.God I want to continue learning and playing go, but its very hard doing so on your own when you know nobody irl who plays it you can learn from. No matter what tools you use playing online just isnt the same for learning. The other warnings anons have posted are also true, but youll always be able to find someone to play with even on the most dead go sites. Also I wish 101weiqi translated better to english half the problems have nonsense broken english translations and gomagic is dogshit in comparison.t. 15kyu shitter
You'd have an easier time finding a manga, it sounds like you want Go Akagi, which could be done tho probably nowhere near as well-written
>>24823505The reviews look good. Not op, but thanks, anon.
>>24823619I used to play shogi with my Japanese host brother and that was fun but I don't remember anything about it anymore. i think shogi is more popular in japan than go
>>24823495Riichi Mahjong is the ultimate asian game
Go is a beautiful game. Extremely simple and extremely complex at the same time. My dad taught me when I was a kid. He became a Go fiend when he was living on a military base in Japan in the 80s and used to talk his way into the local Go clubs with his rudimentary Japanese and play the local old-timers who had never let a white guy in before. I never played it very much but I always liked it more than chess. Love to read about famous moves like the 'ear-reddening move.' Philosophically a perfect game. Also always thought it's interesting that chess masters have a high rate of insanity/psychosis while go masters do not. I do think it might illustrate something about the psychotic competitiveness of western culture as opposed to the collectivism and cooperation of eastern cultures.I can't think of too many books about go other than like Hikaru no Go, which I read some of years ago. I did actually just finish Playground by Richard Powers last week, which has some great passages about Go. One of the narrators is a tech developer who plays go with his best friend in grade school and they both cultivate a lifelong obsession with the game. He talks about AI advancements in relation to go and the first AI that beats a grand master.
>>24823855I kind of like the dynamic the MC and his rival have, it's very thematically fitting an ancient master who was depressed because he couldn't find a rival who could match him vs a post-AI world championship master who was depressed because he couldn't stop losing to the AI and I like the wild metaphors it uses. A go match is compared to a battlefield, to a storm, to a wuxia duel. It's all very entertaining. Though it's still webnovel slop in the end with its usual suspects. China dicksucking (even if toned down, Nipland and Gookland are canonically stronger than China, just waiting for the MC to swoop in and save its reputation), Americans using Chinese names for whatever reason and dicksucking the MC. At least there's no romance/harem. From the little research I did (I don't know how to play Go) the game descriptions seem to be legit. 3-3 invasion WAS considered a bad move before the AI era, it constantly namedrops legit Go terminology like Tiger's Mouth, hane, sente, joseki etc. I was entertained.
>>24823894The irl power ranking is basically Korea > China >> Japan > Taiwan.Honestly if they want to save Go in Asia, just remake the Hikaru no Go anime. Properly of course. With quality animation and OST. The original anime has excellent and extensive OST. Animes don't do that any more.
>>24823891>Playground by Richard Powersis it good? seems short for a richard powers novel
>>24823784>Go AkagiLiterally a thing
>>24823935Name?
>>24823947The divine move
>>24823949ty ty. If the antagonist is like Washizu it's prolly gonna be kino
>>24823923It's pretty good, worth reading especially at a trim 300 pages. I've only read Overstory by him but it seems like it follows his general formula of following an ensemble cast through their lifetimes as they deal with changes in technology and culture. I'm particularly interested in marine biology and AI, which is why I randomly picked this one up at the library. Some beautiful passages about my favorite animal the cuttlefish, some juicy character drama, some surprising narrative collisions. Didn't like the ending. But it is worth reading.
>>24823952I don't remember it quite reaching Washizu levels of kino but it's ntb. Might go rewatch it for a chuckle
>>24823619>"there are so many obscure rules">literally as simple as tic tac toe
>>24824016It's literally not, niggerhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rules_of_Go
>>24824139>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rules_of_GoThere are only 2 rules in go that aren't totally braindead easy to understand, one is ko and that is simple enough once you've actually seen it in a game, the other is the different scoring systems which you just ignore as a new player and stick with Chinese since other rules only exist due to the Japs being autistic. There is stuff like superko and suicide rules but they aren't hard to understand just hard to decide upon as they are fragmented in a bunch of different standards, but ultimately the game plays 99% the same with or without them. And that 99% is very simple>play a stone somewhere>if something has 0 liberties, remove it
>>24824139>Take turns placing a stone on 19 x 19 grid. Black moves first.>If a group of stones is completely surrounded, remove them from the board. You cannot suicide.>You cannot make a move that returns the board to an earlier position.>You can pass when it's your turn. Game is over when both players pass in a row.>Score is number of stones on board plus empty spaces surrounded by your stones. White gets 7.5 bonus points.That's literally it.
>>24823495>Kind of how like our (Western) culture was only focused on war and fighting which gave birth to chess.Chess comes from Asia as well. By the time it reached Europe it already had all the war themed pieces. In fact, it was even more warlike. There was no queen, that's a Western DEI contribution. It was a general or a commander or something like that. But when it comes to Go, you have to play with the Chinese rules. Japanese rules are shit.
>>24823756>As the other guy said, it's not even popular in Asia. It's dying/dead in China, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan.False.>I honestly recommend picking up chess. Don't be a weirdo.Chess is boring and less deep. Weirdos like chess as well.
>>24823505I'm reading this. And it borrowed too much from Hikaru no Go imo. Pretty shameless.
>>2482451430kyu take
>>24824519Did it? I haven't read/watched Hikaru no Go yet, but the webnovel keeps mentioning "muh AI" all the time. And even based on the synopsis it seems different (possession vs actual rebirth).I suppose I'll give it a go since I'm rather enjoying the webnovel. If it really is more of the same, I'm all for it.
