Sinclair ZX Spectrum

Cyrus II

Cyrus II Chess is a chess program, it is the sequel to the acclaimed Cyrus which was released in 1982. This game has most of the features of the earlier game. The board can be viewed in top-down mode or in a 3D isometric mode with the player being able to switch between the two by pressing the ESC key. There are twelve skill levels, level 1 - 9 affect the time the player has to make their move from just 2 seconds per move at level 1 through to a maximum of 3 minutes at level 8. The other three skill levels are Adaptive where Cyrus plays at the same rate as its opponent, Infinite where Cyrus will keep on thinking until told to make a move, and Problem where Cyrus searches for mate in five moves or less. Other features include watching the computer play itself, switching sides, retracting and replaying moves, a hint facility, and being able to set up chess problems for Cyrus to solve. There is also support for a printer so that either the current board or the contents of Cyrus' memory containing the current position plus recent moves can be printed at any time. Additionally the game can be printed move by move as it progresses to preserve the full record.