Chessimo 2.0

I have been a fan of this puzzle set since it was called Personal Chess Trainer 2007. The puzzle set is amazing and the speed at which you can practice a large set of tactics is unmatched. It’s too bad the app is a bit buggy. Chessimo v1 was really good, but didn’t look as sharp as this version. V1 also does not work well in iOS 16 and thus I was forced to upgrade. I had to pay $15 again to continue practicing the puzzle set on my new devices, which would be reasonable if the new app were less buggy. This new version looks a lot better and has a cleaner interface, however the scrolling on the iPad, the inability to reset the puzzle set, and the lack of ability to synchronize with an account despite a login (that also doesn’t work) make it a touch frustrating at times. If these bugs would be worked out, this app would be the absolute best tactics app on the App Store. I still believe in Chessimo despite the issues and hope the app will continue to be supported into the future.

GET THIS APP. Its spaced repetition for tactics is AMAZING and justifies the app ENTIRELY. You start off with pretty basic mate-in-fews, making sure they’re hella drilled in (automatic recognition is the goal), and then builds upon itself with more complicated tactics, allowing you to automate those as well by using the easier (already-automated) tactics as building blocks. There is the same spaced repetition idea for strategic positions as well (which I’ve also found extremely useful!) It even has this for endgames!! I’m convinced this app ALONE is the fastest way to get to 1800 I’ve ever seen. Dev, thank you so much — it would be nice however if you could fix these bugs: (1) I can’t click on any games in the database, making it useless (2) the opening training has MANY lines where there is no end programmed in (many of these are in critical positions as well) resulting in the app freezing up, thereby prohibiting further study of that line (the bug persists, and I’m afraid to uninstall/re-install bc I don’t wanna have to start over with the spaced repetition)

I can’t say enough good things about the tactics this app offers-excellent puzzles and great progression in terms of difficulty. Unfortunately the app itself is full of bugs which makes it very frustrating to use. There are literally too many to list, but one that has popped up recently is when you click on train the window freezes. You can’t tap any of the modules unless you scroll the window several times, then it gets “unstuck”. This isn’t to mention pieces that seem to “fly” off the board at times, or odd, sometimes even negative numbers being displayed in the timer window. I’m not sure it’s worth the trouble to the developers but I would recommend rigorous user testing, or at least test themselves to catch some of these. It’s a shame there are so many issues because the tactics are so darn good.