What If Chess Was a Mexican Standoff

What? How? And Above All: Why?

It’s completely normal for you to have these questions. After all, it’s not every day you’re confronted with such a daring crossover.
But don’t lose your chess-loving head just yet. Everything is less confusing than it seems.
In fact, the concept is so simple it can be broken down into three simple acronyms: ATGP, MAMFAC, PIO.

Analyze the given position.
Make a move for any color.
Play it out.

You read that right. You — as well as your opponent — can make any legal move on the given board, and whoever does so first, kicks off the game with the color of their choice.

But beware:
Are you certain that move isn’t a blunder?
Do you really want that color?
Sure, making a quick good move will give you an edge when the game starts — but a bad one might cost you dearly.

When is the right time to pull the trigger?

Is the question you will ask yourself, while you stare at the board.
The pieces drift before your inner eye like tumbleweed in the desert wind.
The grip on your mouse tightens.
Your palms are sweaty, knees weak, arms heavy...
But this isn't a spaghetti western.
This is Chess It Out – Standoff.

Try it here:
https://chessitout.com/standoff

Technical

Gathering suitable positions was the real challenge. I identified two main criteria that every FEN in the database needed to fulfill:

1. The position can't be (easily) winning for either side.
2. There can't be (too many) obvious moves that are actually good.

I used Stockfish as well as Lc0, analyzing over 200 million positions from the Lichess database. Only about 1,000 met my high standards and made the final cut.