fans of tetris will love it!

Hi r/baduk 👋

I'm the developer of GoKifu AI (囲碁レコAI), a Go study app for iPhone/iPad. It's become pretty popular with players in Japan — even some pros use it — and I've just opened it up worldwide, so I wanted to share it here (and bring a free month for everyone heading to the Go Congress).

🧠 Fast KataGo Analysis：

Full KataGo runs on-device — no server, no internet. Win-rate, score estimate, best moves, and variations, all offline. Perfect for planes, tournaments, or bad Wi-Fi.

📸 Scan a real board with your camera

Point your phone at a physical goban and it reads the whole position instantly — then analyze it, save it, or replay it. This is the feature people love most. (short demo below 👇)

https://reddit.com/link/1v39hjg/video/59fa5cmulqeh1/player

A few other things it does:

- Joseki & fuseki search (learn from 170,000+ pro games)

- Play against legendary Go AIs — Shusaku, Sai, and more.

- Win-rate timeline to see exactly where the game turned

- Mistake finder that flags your biggest slips

- SGF import/export & kifu recording

🎁 Free month for the U.S. Go Congress

To celebrate the Congress (Boston, Jul 25–Aug 1), here's a code for 1 month free:

Code: USGOEU2026

Redeem: https://apps.apple.com/redeem?ctx=offercodes&id=6760015698&code=USGOEU2026

(Expires Aug 10 — not available in Japan. Just open the link on your iPhone or iPad, and the offer will be applied automatically in the App Store.)

📲 Download on the App Store: https://apps.apple.com/app/id6760015698

A note on availability 🙏

Not on Android or in the EU yet — Android is in active development, and I'm still sorting out the EU's publishing rules (they'd expose my home address, so I'm holding off for now). Please hang in there — it's coming, and I think you'll really like it!

Thanks for taking a look! 🙏

After watching Shin Jin-seo vs Kata Go, I have mixed feelings.

Game 1 was definitely my favorite, KataGo started with a novel creative fuseki. Game 2 included a very long book joseki lasting 50 moves that favored Shin. Game 3 had simple joseki variations that naturally led to settled living groups for both sides with little fighting.

Game 2 and 3 were somewhat of a letdown because it relied so heavily on a combination of book knowledge and submissive play from the human side. In fact, it felt like the AI was being more creative than the human. White's fuseki in Game 1 was already giving a really cool feeling.

I'm a low-dan Fox player and I'm fond of the romantic style. I love making bold moves that feel like overplays, and challenging my opponent to punish. I try to win by as many points as possible, rather than just 0.5. And many of my games don't go to scoring because someone resigns.

Ever since the AI revolution, advanced Go discussion has really become heavily analytical. Moves are evaluated by their winrate rather than their fighting spirit. Frankly, I will pick an aggressive continuation over one that is submissive but has a better win-rate.

The Ear-Reddening Game, the Game of the Century, and the Sixteen Soldiers Game are all great matches that would not stand the test of AI.

Disclaimer. Obviously, the gap between non-professional and professional is wide and a pro can play any style against an amatuer who memorized an AI opening, and the pro will still win. So I'm not suggesting that AI is the only correct way for students to learn to play.

Algun libro que me recomienden para empezar a jugar al go (baduk ) hablo español y un poquito inglés

Also what are japanese, chinese, new zealand etc countries rules like why isn't there a standard rulebook and can someone differentiate between the rules of every country thank you very much. Edit: i am aware that they give the same result approximately, but i asked because i saw players online favoring chinese rules so i wondered what was that about

I just realized how great ogs is and I'm having a lot of fun! If you wanna join me i go by the same username on ogs, thelastnetizen.

Hey everyone! I made a working board in Minecraft!

Hi all, I made a thing these last few months (10 according the commit history).

Hoshizora (starry sky, you know hoshi)

It was primarily for me to put on the TV while I do other things, as a piece of moving art¹.

It replays random professional games, one per hour, synced: meaning everyone watching the site sees the same game at the same moment.

You can also browse the game archive to watch a specific game, or tune in to another synchronized “channel.” For example, if you choose a channel containing all Honinbo games, everyone watching that channel will see the same randomly selected game at the same point.

Everyone watching the Cho Chikun games will see the same Cho Chikun game at the same move.

You can, of course, opt out of synchronization and scrub through the moves as you like.

Long pressing on the goban copies the url to that particular game so it can be shared or found again more easily.

The archive of games comes from Mr Brouwer https://homepages.cwi.nl/~aeb/go/games/games/

¹: hence the stars in the background and stuff, I spent far too long on the different woods

edit: syntax, orthograph

I've been starting to learn to play go over the past few days. I have played around 20 games on AI sensei and seem to win every game against the 30kyu one, win about 75% of the time against the 29kyu one and lose every time against the 28kyu one. I use the game reviews and quizzes but feel like I have no real direction on how to actually improve.

I am a student so money is not in abundance so I'm looking to what your ideas would be for an absolute beginner to improve their skill at low cost. I just currently feel like I have heard of different resources but am struggling to know how to use them and which ones to use effectively and would appreciate a sense of direction to how to actually improve.

Any advice is greatly appreciated thank you!

Edit: to clarify this is all in 9x9

So as you might guess im a beginner. And I heard the proverb of losing your first 100 Games fast many times already.

Some times when i find time to play a bit i think to myself why not just play a quick game against a Bot on OGS or on JustGo. But the more i try to learn about the game the harder i feel like bots really throw me of. Like they play what, to a beginner trying to hold on to vague opening principle, looks like outrageously bad moves in the beginning (Obviously to match their rank) but suddenly they tie it to together completely overwhelming me.

I get that im just bad this is not me being angry about losing. Its more like i try to play a principled game to get a feel for it and it just unleashes complete chaos onto me. So i lose confidence in trying to uphold those principles (like corners>sides>center, mostly 3/4th line moves etc.)

I dont really know where to go with this beyond describing my exp. I feel like it may not really equal at all the progress/learning that you get from playing a human on your skill level or someone better.

Well thats all I had to say im very interested to see what everyone thinks! Still hanging in there haha

Whoever said these 25kyu bots were easy and good for beginners, you lie, I'm getting smoked lol.

My 3 1/2 year old granddaughter is coming to stay with us for a week. I would like to begin to introduce her to Go. This question is for anyone who has taught very young kids. Do you have any suggestions for first steps. Where to begin? What to teach and when? And how to make the experience fun from the outset?

My basic initial thought is to start with just placing stones on a nine by nine board, maybe making patterns. Then taking turns. Then looking at liberties. Then letting different colored stones touch. Is this a good plan? How much can a bright child absorb?

Thanks in advance for any tips.