Modern Chess Openings, 15th Edition

Good opening sets the stage for starting out in a superior position, a must use reference book for anyone that wants to increasing your rating

I bought this particular copy for some aspiring chess players. I am beyond the point where I'm going to study openings in any sort of formal manner. I first read this book at least 20+ years ago and I worked through many of the variations in the book for some of the openings that I preferred. You could probably spend at least half a lifetime investigating all of the openings contained in this book.I used this book to attack opponents who were less salient in opening theory. If you are serious about learning chess, you can't hardly beat MCO as the defacto standard for the opening game. I'm torn between learning the end game before opening theory, but you can't hardly do one without the other. This is probably not the most recent edition, but if you're looking for a big list of standard openings and their numerous variations, just about any recent revision should work nicely. If you're not really interested in working with a few chess sets and several positions at the same time, you may not be interested in this title. Imagine 20+ variations to every opening and a dissertation on the pros and cons of each in relatively terse prose. That's MCO in a nutshell. If you feel that you need opening study, this is the bible of openings in chess.If you've ever had someone smack you down and claim some named opening for which you had no knowledge of, then you probably need this book to continue your chess prowess. If you're not really ready to study the positions and work through them...you may want to pass. If you want to kill at chess, you should already own this book--in a hopefully recent rendition. If you have *never* studied openings, then buy the cheapest version because there is a lot of value in the basic openings that are fully commented in this book.

I purchased this for my husband who loves chess. With all of the unlimited resources online, I wasn't sure how well a book would serve him. But it is a nice way to stay focused and on topic for an avid chess player in your life. My husband wanted to work on his opening moves and this was just what he was looking for. Good price for a good gift.

Not much to say about this classic. I've owned editions from the late 1960s when they used descriptive notation, which frequently led to errors on my chessboard attempting to follow opening moves and variations. The use of algebraic notation is so much easier. Still this is on paper, so using a board is still essential. It is IMO, the best and most complete opening reference generally available (in book form). It's the most recent version I could find, so opening theory since this was published (2008; 16 years ago!) is a bit out-of-date for new theory, but I am not a grandmaster, and find this reference serves me quite well. I do often use it with chess analysis software as a learning aid, so I don't think I'm losing much, but gaining a lot.This is a paperback with substantial pages, which presents the main drawback if heavily used - I suspect it will not wear well over time. My old hardcover MCOs were well-made; I still have them and they're intact.I don't think there is a newer version than MCO-15. If there is, I couldn't find it. Openings databases have likely supplanted paper book references. I like hard copy I can annotate.

All openings that I need to master is inside of this book!

I'm just going to admit it: I'm 10 pages into this tome. So why review it? Well, it's simple: it will take me a year to study the Kings Gamit, the first opening addressed in the book in the first ~5 pages. (It may take longer. I don't know. I guess it depends on how far I want to go using just this book.) There is so much to learn here, I'm sure I will never get close to reading, or understanding, all of it. However, this is a reference book. It's not a page to page epic, but if you want to understand an opening and it's variations, this is the book for you. Frankly, I'm amazed by what I've read about one opening.

My son in law loves chess and wanted to study more on first moves. I got this as a birthday present for him. He said this book was very interesting and helpful.

I mean it's just a great book for everyone, from beginners to more advanced players. It gots all the most important lines on a lot of openings, it's a very good way to learn theory and start building a great opening repertory. It doesn't contain all the opening lines but it got all the most important ones which is totally find.For example, as a beginner, I'm a huge fan of the Scandinavian defense, also known in the book as the center counter defense, and I was hoping to explore more of his variation like the closed Scandinavian. But the book actually only has the mainline (3...Qa5) and the modern variation (2...Nf6) with 3 main lines for ich with minors lines which is ok, but I'm still a little disappointed about that since I was hoping to see at list the Qe6 and Qe8 Lines which doesn't appear.But still, I highly recommend this book to anyone. God blesses u all, have a good.Update 05/15/2021It doesn't have the Fried liver attack line from the two knights' defense, but it surprisingly has the Traxler counterattack also as the Wilkes-Barre in the book.