Contest news    (March 14)

After 2½ months of intensive testing we report that nobody was able to find a stronger personality in CATEGORY-I (playing games).

Sometimes engine-engine matches started very promising but after more games the balance ended in favor of the default settings of Rebel Century.

Having done many of these experiments ourselves lately Rebel Company also could not find a clear improvement EXCEPT lowering the [Chess Knowledge] parameter to 25% which is one of the key improvements of Rebel Century 1.2 (already available for download).

Rebel Company considers it as a pity nobody noticed that lowering the [Chess Knowledge] parameter apparently was the key to make Rebel a stronger computer vs computer player. The classic theme chess knowledge versus speed remains actual and needs the constant attention of chess programmers for the near future.

Now that no prize money is given for CATEGORY-I Rebel Company feels the need to divide the prize money in another way. We have decided to double the prizes of the 3 winners of CATEGORY-I (tactics) Thus:

• Eric Campos, his Q3 personality scored an incredible elo of 2995! Eric receives $400.
  
  
• Jeff Lischer, his personality scored an elo of 2965, Jeff collects $200.
  
  
• Christian BONNIN, his MACHEID personality scored an elo of 2940. Christian gets the small jackpot of $100.
  
  

Rebel Company also likes to reward 2 special personalities for playing games because they have a very interesting playing style. During our testing we noticed that some of the personalities people contributed changed Rebel into a brilliant chess player at some stages of a game. It is a pity these engines in other areas of the game could not compete against the rock solid default settings of Rebel Century.

• Marc van Hal his Alexander Alekhine personality plays brilliant chess at times. It is a real pleasure to play against this personality. This personality plays a kind of bluff chess, it scatters with pawns as soon as it smells your king or notices other positional advantages. Marc receives $200.



• Howard Exner his personality for tactics is already mentioned and available for download from the Rebel Home Page. His engine for playing games did not bad at all in the contest and was close to a 100% score. The nice thing about this engine is its very natural, balanced and strong attacking style. Howard receives $100.

You can now download the 2 special personalities and change your Rebel Century into an even more attractive opponent to play against.

Download the 2 rewarded engines

This ends the REBEL CENTURY contest. Rebel Company likes to thank all who have participated in the contest. It was a lot of fun to do.

Rebel Century 1.2    (February 4)

We have received quite a number of questions regarding the 2 new chess engine options of Rebel Century 1.2 see also the discussions on REBEL-BOARD

4.3.12  Fast Evaluation

"Fast Evaluation" is a specific method for computer chess.

When this option is activated, the "Rebel personality" (see "Personalities") parameter Chess Knowledge will be set to a fixed value of 25.

If this option isn't activated, Rebel will use a more intelligent form of the Chess Knowledge parameter. Depending on the position Rebel will use its own preferred value of the Chess Knowledge parameter which is in the range of 25-500 for each position even in the search. It will typically slowdown Rebel with 25-30% but the returned analysis is more accurate making Rebel a better player against humans.

Remark: If this option isn't activated you more or less are playing against the original Rebel Century from Cdrom PLUS all the speed-up improvements from version 1.2.


4.3.13  Fast Search

"Fast Search" is a specific method for computer chess. This engine feature will speed-up the Rebel search process with about 25% due to a new pruning algorithm. The algorithm has proven to be very solid and it is advised to have it active all the time.


An updated manual will be availabe soon for download.

Rebel Century 1.2    (February 1)

We managed to port the new and much stronger 10d engine (as announced below) to the Rebel Century outlook. The update is called REBEL CENTURY 1.2 and is now available for Century customers for free from the subscription area.

More information at this special page.

Engine news    (January 21)

Expected within a few weeks is a major engine update for REBEL-CENTURY customers. This version is for for computer-computer lovers in the first place. Expected elo performamce gain in the computer-computer area is at least 50 ELO points above REBEL-CENTURY and maybe even a lot more as our tests so far indicate.

This comp-comp engine is the result of the conclusions from the Chess in 2010 topic introduced by Rebel programmer Ed Schröder last year.

The engine is based on Rebel 10c concept but is completely rewritten. The engine will be released in the REBEL 10 outlook as Rebel 10d.


Characteristics of Rebel 10d

• 3 times faster than Rebel Century on short times controls.



• On longer time controls version 10d typically hits 2-3 plies more than Rebel Century.



• On longer time controls (40/2:00) on a fast PC (500 Mhz) version 10d typically hits 11-13 plies average.

More info at release time. Rebel 10d will be available from the subscription area for Rebel Century customers.


IMPORTANT to realize

Use Rebel Century for playing games and analysis, Rebel Century is more accurate in positional understanding.

Use Rebel 10d for computer versus computer and quick blunder check, Rebel 10d is much better in this area than the more knowledgeable Rebel Century.

For reasons of complexity it was not possible to combine version 10d and Rebel Century into one program.

Release status    (October 14)

Official release Rebel Century!

Dealer shipments and private customer deliveries started!


10 reasons to buy REBEL CENTURY (all are included at the special, low price)

1. REBEL is generally accepted as the most human-like playing chess program.

2.  Rebel Century chess engine is now fully user definable via so-called Personalities.

3.  REBEL Subscribe: (the monthly games update is already worth the end-price).

4.  Many chess engine improvements (estimated at +30 ELO) and useful features added.

5.  The $2000 contest (make your own Personality)

6.  Superb database including a highly qualified database of 510,000 games.

7.  A brand new EOC: a chess tree of 28 million positions.

8.  The best of REBEL GOLD (a former stand-alone Rebel product).

9.  Century customers are offered 10% discount on the new ChessBits magazine.

10. 2 external popular programs EPD2DIAG and ECTOOL (including Rebel chess engines).



The end-user-price of Rebel Century is ONLY $39.95 and will remain valid until at least December 31, 1999. After that we expect the price to go up again to the old level of $59.95.

This is our special way of helping you celebrate the new century early!

Release status    (October 5)

The duplication factory just informed us that the Rebel Century cdroms will be ready next week Tuesday October 12.

Dealer shipments and private customer deliveries will start as soon as the cdroms are in our possession.

Upgrade Policy    (September 26)

Due to the low prices of chess software nowadays Rebel Company has sharpened their Upgrade Policy for future Rebel versions.

All details HERE

Ordering    (September 25)

Ordering pages updated. You can now order Rebel Century on-line.

• Order directly from REBEL company (Holland)



• Order directly from REBEL company (VISA payments)



• Order directly from REBEL company (MASTERCARD payments)
  
  

Delivery of orders beginning October.

Release status    (September 24)

The Master cdrom of Rebel Century is ready to send to the duplication factory. From there is usually takes 5-7 (working) days. It's expected you can obtain Rebel Century beginning October from your local dealer.

Engine status    (September 23)

Programmer Ed Schroder found a (last minute) 20% overall speed-up for his REBEL. Specificly 10-15% for the end-game and 25-30% for the middle-game.

Book-learning    (September 19)

Book-learning has been made more aggressive. It will avoid that you can repeat games you previouly have won against Rebel. A second goal is to perform better in computer-computer play. To activate the aggressive book-learner include "B" to the command-line. More information in the README file (menu START).

CHESSBITS    (September 17)

Included on the CENTURY cdrom is a DEMO of the ChessBits magazine (cdrom version) plus a discount offer of 10% for Rebel Century users.

The Rebel Manual    (September 17)

The Rebel manual comes in 5 languages (english, german, spanish, french and dutch). All text in the Rebel Century program is also available in these 5 lanuages.

Besides the build-in on-line manual in Rebel Century it-self on your CENTURY cdrom you will find an english version in WINHELP and BROWSER format. Put the Rebel Century cdrom in your drive (your browser will start) and then click on the corresponding screen item. For an impression click HERE