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KingsRow

KingsRow is a strong checkers and draughts engine. It was released by Ed Gilbert in 2000.

The checkers engine can be used with the CheckerBoard GUI. The engine is available as freeware.

History

In the only Computer Checkers World Championship, KingsRow took second place behind Nemesis.

KingsRow was stronger than Cake++ in the early years. Cake++ finally caught up with KingsRow and gradually became stronger. It competed a 624 games match against Cake++ on Thanksgiving 2004 and Cake++ won 3 to 1 with 620 games ending in a draw. On July 17, 2005, Ed Gilbert completed building a 10-piece endgame database for use with KingsRow.

The top checkers engines like KingsRow are nearly unbeatable today. Due to their large opening books the engines stay long enough in the book so that the search function sees a database draw in the endgame tablebase.

A version for Italian checkers with an nine-piece endgame tablebase is available too.

Draughts version

A 10x10 version of KingsRow was started in 2007. In 2009, an eight-piece endgame tablebase was finished. With checkers solved and all top engine matches ending in draws only, KingsRow focusses on 10x10 draughts only today.

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