Welcome to the ICGA website: A welcome from the President.

This site, representing the ICGA community, aims to be a site of prime interest to computer-game enthusiasts across a wide spectrum of games. We hope you appreciate it and invite you to contribute to this site through the feedback channels, and consider joining the ICGA if you are not a member.

Computer Olympiad registration fees

Posted on June 13, 2019 by mjlef

Advance payments are preferred and can be made in any of the following ways:

  1. By direct bank transfer to ING Bank, the Netherlands, IBAN NL34INGB0003988921, BIC INGBNL2A, Leiden, the Netherlands.
  2. By PayPal service via the Internet. Name of ICGA is info@icga.org.
  3. Payment by credit card (Visa/Mastercard). Send your credit-card details (Visa or Mastercard, full name on card, card number, expiry date, and address), the amount to be paid to Hiroyuki Iida, Email: iida@jaist.ac.jp, Business Fax: +81 (761) 51 1149.
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Hotel rooms in Macao

Posted on May 13, 2019 by mjlef

Participants in the ICGA events in Macao may, if they book quickly, take advantage of the IJCAI special hotel rates, which are available for a modest number of rooms. 

In order to see the possibilities and make your reservations please visit:

http://ijcai19.medmeeting.org/en

When booking please indicate that you are a particpant in the ICGA events.

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2019 Chess, Computer Olympiad and Conference information

Posted on March 13, 2019 by Jan Krabbenbos

The information about the 2019 ICGA events in Macao can be found as follows:

  • Information about the 16th ACG conference can be found here: ACG 16.
  • Information about the Chess events can be found here: Chess Events
  • Information about the Computer Olympiad can be found here: Computer Olympiad.
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A NEW PRESIDENT

Posted on December 11, 2018 by mjlef

Announcement by David Levy

During the ICGA’s triennial meeting in Stockholm this past July, I announced that the term of office commencing this year would definitely be my final period as President. I have held the position from 1986-1992 and from 1999 to the present day, and it is high time for someone younger to take on the Presidency.

In fact I had already tried but failed to find a replacement President to take over as from July, but none of the three people I asked, any of whom would be an outstanding President in my opinion, were available. In each case they responded that they had too many commitments to be able to devote themselves sufficiently to the demands of the ICGA.

Since then, however, things have changed. I am delighted to report that Professor Jonathan Schaeffer is now available. I shall therefore be calling a special meeting of members, when I shall propose that Jonathan take over the presidency. That meeting will take place during the period August 10th-16th 2019, in Macao, where the ICGA will be holding its annual events – the World Computer Chess Championships, the Computer Olympiad, and the Conference on Computer Games. These will take place alongside the 2019 IJCAI Conference, and the ICGA is proud to be associated with IJCAI in this way for the second successive year.

Jonathan needs no introduction to ICGA members and the computer games community at large. His achievements in our field are legendary. He led the Chinook program team, the first program to win a human world championship in any game (he later solved the game of Checkers, proving that the result with best play is a draw). He also led a team that developed a world champion level Hold ‘Em poker program, and in his youth he was the author of the Phoenix program which tied for 1st place in the 1986 World Computer Chess Championship.

http://webdocs.cs.ualberta.ca/~jonathan/

I have unbounded confidence that Jonathan will be an extremely popular and successful ICGA President, and will take the ICGA to a new level within the world of AI.

David Levy

London, December 2018

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2019 World Computer Chess Championships, Computer Olympiad and Games Conference to be held in Macao

Posted on December 10, 2018 by mjlef

The International Computer Games Association (ICGA) is very pleased to announce that our 2019 events will be held in Macao, alongside the annual conference of the International Joint Conference for Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI).

The dates are August 10th-16th. Full details will appear in due course.

The World Computer Chess Championships will be sponsored with a 5,000 Euro prize fund, and travel subsidies for chess programs rated 2500 or more.

More details of the IJCAI conference can be found at https://ijcai19.org/

David Levy

[President – ICGA]

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ICGA joins IJCAI 2019 in Macau

Posted on December 10, 2018 by Jan Krabbenbos

All ICGA events in 2019 will be held in Macau, together with the IJCAI 2019. The dates for the event are 10-16 August 2019. More information will follow, but for information on the IJCAI you can have a look at https://ijcai19.org.

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Ben Mittman (1928-2018)

Posted on October 4, 2018 by mjlef
We are very sad to report the passing of Professor Benjamin Mittman, the Founding President of the ICCA (fore-runner of the ICGA).. Ben had an enormous influence on the world of Computer Chess, having encouraged the team of David Slate, Larry Atkin (and at first Keith Gorlen), who developed the famous Northwestern University “Chess” program throughout the 1970s. Ben was also instrumental in organising most of the world’s computer chess tournaments during the early years of this competitive activity.
Ben died in his sleep on September 27th, just short of his 90th birthday.
A full obituary will be posted in due course.
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ICGA Constitution and By-Laws

Posted on July 30, 2018 by mjlef

David Levy reports: At the ICGA’s tri-ennial meeting, held in Stockholm and Taiwan in July 2018, the rather outdated Articles and By-Laws were replaced with a set which better reflects the current form of the ICGA. The new Articles and By-Laws are presented below.

There was no need for any elections of office bearers since only one nomination had been received by the ICGA for each position. For the period 2018-2021 the ICGA’s office bearers are:

President:  David Levy

Vice-Presidents: Mark Winands and I-Chen Wu

Secretary-Treasurer:  Hiroyuki Iida

Programmers’ Representative:  Mark Lefler

You will find the tri-ennial meeting revised ICGA Constitution and By-Laws here: https://icga.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/2018-Constitution-and-By-Laws.pdf

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Komodo is World Computer Chess Champion 2018

Posted on July 19, 2018 by Jan Krabbenbos

Komodo completed the triple this year by also winning the World Computer Chess Championship 2018 after a play-off with GridGinkgo. GridGinkgo became second after it lost the play-off with 1½-½. Because Jonny won from Leela Chess Zero, it became third.

The photo shows the Komodo team, Mark Lefler (c) and Erdogan Gunes (l) who received the Shannon Trophy (and replica) from the chairman of the ICGA David Levy.

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GridGinkgo versus Komodo play-off

Posted on July 19, 2018 by Jan Krabbenbos

The play-off between GridGinkgo and Komodo has started. They play first a match of two games with 30 minutes plus 15 seconds per moves. If that is equal, there will be a match with 15 minutes. If still no decision, there will be a match of 5 minutes plus 5 seconds per move. Worst case there is an armageddon game with 6 minutes for white and 3 minutes for black with 5 seconds per move.

See http://view.livechesscloud.com/7c104c94-c119-441e-a444-b0f22a1880d0 for the live games.

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