A core speciality of AI Factory, Shogi (alternatively known in the West as Japanese Chess), has been involved in many World Championship events. This product "Shotest" currently sells in Japan, where it was for some time the top selling Shogi program. Shotest has been competing in the World Computer Shogi Championships in Japan since 1997, where it created great interest as it was a new western program, but immediately ranked 13th from 33 programs, already making it by far the most successful western shogi program to compete in the competition.

The following 2 years Shotest twice came 3rd from 35 programs, only narrowly missing 1st place by finally losing to a program it had already beaten. In all it has beaten 3 different world champions on 6 occasions in the year they were world champion. No other western program has matched this ranking. It also won Gold, Silver and Bronze medal in the World Computer Olympiads in the years 2001, 2000 and 2002. See the AI Factory newsletter for competition reports and articles on Shotest.

Shogi is a complex and rich game, offering many more possibilities than Western Chess. It has not achieved great notoriety in the west, partly due to the difficulty of using Japanese Kanji pieces. However this game dominates Japan more than Chess dominates the west, with a very high percentage of Japanese playing it. The 3D implementation adds a new richness to computer Shogi play.

Our Shotest Shogi is now available on Xbox Live Arcade, with an immersive 3D environment, beautiful pieces in Kanji and western designs, and an easy-to-use interactive tutorial.

BUY Unbalance 3D Shogi for PC (Site in Japanese)