I saw a simpler way to rig this a decade or two back: the chessboards were arranged in a hotel lobby around a large solid diameter circular column, so no player could see the adjacent games. The trickster walked around the outside, from board to board, and only had to remember one move, because the layout meant that he did not have to separate the players who were playing each other.The other way he made it easy on himself was to have an even number of players. This simplified hustle would not require any chess playing skill whatsoever to "win" half the games against the world's best, and makes minimal demands on memory.
1:59 I love how he says he has been reading all of their transcripts, but he didn't bother learning their names... not that it's important, but still. Makes the lie more believable.
And, if he has to wait for the other player to move, it means he would have to go around 2-3x for every move at least. Probably way more. Which made the whole thing seem really weird to chess pros.
Prometheus4096 What? No... The trick was playing them against each other and beating one of them. Also, I don't mean to be rude at all, but it's 'taught' not 'learned' if you're looking for the past tense of someone teaching something to someone else.
Patrik Manni Yes. It is an old well known trick among chess players. Has been used several times by correspondence chess players. And 'to teach' and 'to learn' are two different verbs. No idea why you are confused about that.
Prometheus4096 You said "Chess players learned him...". That makes no sense. It's supposed to be "Chess players taught him..." or "He learnt this trick from...".
I think the mistake in the "prediction" is not an accident. The paper inside the envelope had a 6 on the front of it all along. With some excellent sleight of hand, Derren sticks the paper with the rest of the numbers to the piece of paper with the 6 which the chess player is holding. So the piece with the 6 never leaves the man's hand and the 6 is in sight the whole time. I'm guessing 6 is statistically the most likely number of pieces left on a chess board when a game is over. Derren got quite lucky, because he was only one off. Ofcourse, he would have been REALLY lucky if that player had had exactly 6 pieces left :-)
***** I don't understand why he didn't make the trick with 100% though - there was a game which finished with 6 pieces, he could just use it instead of applying the prediction "6" to the game which finished with 7 pieces.
My guess is that Derren managed to get Graham Lee on table #1 in on the trick. And he didn't play table 1 v. table 5, he played table 5 v. table 9. So when Derren used sleight of hand opening the letter, Graham didn't protest since he was in on the trick. The mistake at the beginning serves to deflect attention away from Graham. OK I'm sorry, after looking at the results, it couldn't have been exactly like that. But is it possible Derren somehow brought two games back to Graham--one they played on the table, and another they signaled to each other based on game #9? It's not unheard of for a master to play two games at once, especially when one of them is against the president of a chess club who is not ranked.
You can see exactly how he does the numbers trick if you pay close attention when he takes the folded up paper from the chess guy. When he takes it, he hides it behind another folded up paper, and then keeps it hidden between the paper as it is unfolded. It's sleight of hand.
@tassay You’re right, but the pro’s would understand they were playing a poor game. But I was mistaken, I understand how he did it, the players did effectivaly play between each other. Table 1: memorize player 1’s move Table 5: Play player 1’s move Wait for player 5 to play memorize player 5’s move Table 1: Play player 5’s move Wait for player 1 to play Got to the start.
I would find a task like this incredibly difficult catering to only 2 pairs of games. To do that with four pairs while SIMULTANEOUSLY playing a real game of chess is absolutely stunning. This man's mental capacity is mind-blowing.
Funny how none of the players found it normal for some games to be played with the white and some with the black pieces by Darren. Darren should be getting the white pieces in all games, per normal procedure.
hthought that wouldn't change much. There's a way to transform the boards colours backwards in your brain. Just mirror and flip then invert the colours
@@ComedyPal667 It's not about color, it's about who moves first. White always makes the first move, thus mirroring an opponent against another opponent becomes effectively impossible unless their starting order is also mirrored.
I figured out what he was doing as soon as I saw half the players had opposite colors, but the execution and the additional trick of "predicting" pieces left over were excellent showmanship.
ostkartong I know nothing about magic, but some kinda weird something goes on from 6:18 - 6:21. During that time, he's actually physically holding the papers in his hand, directing how exactly how it's unfolded, etc, using the 6 (the number he got wrong) as a shield. 3 seconds seems like an eternity in the world of sleight of hand. Also, whether he's technically lying is probably completely meaningless because all of that, "As you can see, there are no mirrors," type of talk that magicians do is just a misdirection anyway. Who cares that he never touches the envelope? It seems to have successfully distracted us from the fact that he unnecessarily grasps and spins and unfolds the paper itself, even though the assistant is probably wholly capable of unfolding a piece of paper.
Brown probably payed Chan off here.... Chans rated 1500 and that aint that bad.. to be sure to win derren would have to be around 1700+ and that while remembering all the moves on the other tables. Many players play for years without reaching 1700 + rating so Chan was likely bribed..
Probably my favorite Derren Brown. I love proper planning and preparation and the high you get when you succeed, not the recognition you get for doing it but being recognized that you did it. You know what I mean?
@Rimber6 You don't get it. He never really opened. On the boards where he was white, he played the moves his opponents on the other side of the room played before him.
this could be done better with radio micro-earphone and a computer computers nowadays play better than top humans, so they can beat average grandmaster easily get an assistant who would watch through hidden camera, input human moves into computer and tell magician which peace to move and you dont even need to know chess rules
Seems plausible. The only issue is that even an average chess hobbiest can tell they are playing against a computer after a dozen or so moves, let alone grandmasters.
Well, that depends on what you mean by better. It wasn't about beating people at chess most efficiently, it was about what he was able to do by memory.
Holy smokes, that is a very clever way to simultaneously play nine games of chess -- four against grandmasters -- and come out on top overall. It's something that I now want to try, as that was just... wow. Clever.
This supports my theory that most UA-cam video titles are lies. (in this one, the lie is that he beats the 9 players- obviously false to anyone who's watched the video) #MostUA-camVideoTitlesAreLies
This is impossible to do the way he explained it. From what I could see he started playing as black and opened c5 against whites e4. He divided all of them into pairs, meaning that the other pair across from the "e4-c5"-table have to play exactly the same as the "e4-c5"-table. Let's say he try to copy the e4 move at the other table, and his opponent answers with for example e5, then it's suddenly a totally different game and he's screwed right from beginning.
Its important to also see that this could be done on any number of people at the same time. as long as you can remember 2 digts for each game skipped (the notation of the move) I dont think there is a pocket trick with the number. It is 2 sided to be sure, 1 number is wrong (which happens to be the game he actually played). Most obvious explination I can think of is by looking at end game positions of games recorded for that specific player.
@ Schusterlehrling: Okay, if player A plays white against B and black against C, and C opens the game with, say, 1. e4, then A can open his game against B with 1. e4 as well (wonderful trick, I never had figured that out). But from this point on it is simply possible, no: very likely, that the games take different courses. A's problem is that he can't just switch between the boards at will, but has to work them sequentially. So your explanation doesn't work here.
At the same time, it's his turn to play on one of the boards and his opponent's turn to play in the other board. They are using different colors, he's not playing at the same color in both to allow his opponent to make different options.
@Tweakisher no they would eventually play a different move and even if he then went to the other board and play the same move, he would possibly get a different result depending on how far into the game he was going.
It's not about figuring out the trick, it's about using his technics, which he also describe in his book; "Derren Brown - Tricks of the Mind". It's about memorising patterns, and how to use them.
@BillMan2002 he explains in the video, there is a pattern to each player he goes against, he just repeats another players move against another player, in other words he is a vessel for a chess match between different players.
Whatever move player #1 does, he will do against player #2. the reaction of player #2 he will do against player #1. Then repeat that process so basicly player #1 and #2 are playing against eachother. It doesn't matter what move they do, he will always copy it.
I really enjoyed this. They were actually playing each other, he was merely exhibiting a fantastic ability to remember things. As for the prediction of number of pieces left, that was his magician persona tossed in for fun. He pulled a trick on that one somehow or another, lol.
Having played a lot of chess, and not being too shabby at it, I new his trick the second the cameras showed the boards alternating. I knew at some level he was just mimicking games. Brilliant trick though!
@IEatCray0ns If i recall correctly I think at the beginning of the show, he was a bystander that picked up the pay phone when it rang. He past out like that, and suddenly gained consciousness later on at the end of the show.
@Darth814Vader keep in mind he claims he was playing one real game of chess, but at the same time he was getting a variety of moves and ideas from grand/international masters. Also, Derren has exceptional memory (the average human can only remember 7 things at once, and he was able to remember 8 while playing a game of real chess). Derren probably has studied chess quite be on par with great players and felt confident in his playing ability.
@ensilver1 I realized after watching this again, that he does keep the matches on opposite sides, and the barriers are in place to prevent them from seeing each other. I had an issue with the fact that he'd have to wait for a response each time before being able to play it on the other board, which could seem strange. Also interesting is the weakest player 'felt' he was of grandmaster material (in the game he really played himself).
6:17 the moment when he comes back he tug onto the paper, its at this moment he executes a good-ole-magician trick, thus making it seem like he predicted a numbers, the mirror chess setup was a very great system he discovered, that is amazing
@NameMoon I think you're up to something there. Most magician wanted some kind of recognition of magical power that they possess after the performance they did. Otherwise, there is no point of doing these performances. The reason he gives away the "secret" of his success is because he wants us to think that these were legitimate chess games while in fact each game was all pre-memorized by each players. Yeah, good touch on the number "6" mistake. It makes most of us a believer.
I agree. The last guy, Robert Chan is president of king's college London, chess society, so he is the head of a club or something of the sort. So that case, you have to be looking at him being somewhere around the 1600-1800+ range ELO. Derren Brown must be somewhere around there to beat him.
@NightHawk0085 That leaves the problem of Chan responding differently than the player he is supposed to mimic, leaving an entirely different boardstate in just a few turns.
In a way Darren is like a referee in the middle. A variant known as Blind chess takes this where there are 2 players and a referee between them. Each player only sees a board with their own pieces on the board and makes a move. The referee makes this move on the middle board which has both white and black pieces on it. The ref goes over to blacks table and than Black moves. Hard to checkmate because you can only see your own pieces and hope for the best...
As for the prediction of the pieces left...anytime the magician touches the thing to be revealed before it's actually been revealed (6:18) then you can bet some sleight has been done.
Make no mistake, they did to. This is a very well known and easy to think of trick that everyone who has played a decent amount of chess would have both though about themselves or heard about. Everyone in the room knew what was going on, the only thing I'm surprised about is that the GM's were pretty decent at pretending to be fooled.
@zreeper No it's possible, but here is how it works. So he goes to table 1 and lets the other player go first. Then he doesn't make a move and walks to the next table pretending he's thinking. Once he gets to table 7 he goes first using the table 1's move. He watches table 7's responding move and walks to the next table. Once he get's back to table 1 he uses table 7's responding move. Repeat!
as for the numbers, I think there are 2 strong possibilities. 1. He chose random numbers and tried to make them fit, but failed. 2. he did something when he helped the chess master open the package that he gave him.
@13rAdJa13 The confusing part isnt how he did it, its how he knew the numbers of the pieces left at the end of each game before the games started (the envelope). No part of him copying the other players' moves explains how he knew this. Can you?
He just remember the move someone plays and repeat it on the other board. Then, after his opponent replies with his own move, he repeats that move on the other board, and so on. For example, his opponent starts with e4. He doesn't have to respond immediately, so he just moves on. Then, when he gets to the board that's paired with the board in which the player started with e4, he also plays e4. And then, he copies whatever his opponent's response is back on the other board when he gets there.
@zreeper The reason this is possible to do using a computer against someone over internet is because you can change the situation you want against a computer by just moving pieces how you want, but you can't do that in a real game.
White is better simply because it has the first move. With accurate play black can turn the tables or can allow white to have a strong center in exchange for something else, like a strong king side attack or something. Different opening variations make these kinds of trade offs all the time. But at the start white having the first move is an advantage and that is bound to influence win percentage overall.
One way he could have done the trick with the number is to simply guess (with the help of some analysis like "what opening will he most likely play etc.) and if the number is close enough (one wrong) reveal it, otherwise look for nine other players and do the whole show again. He used this "trick" in another episode when he convinced several people they'd guess the right horses and only showed the one person who won on tv.
Actually, he does not make tzhe moves in sequence. And btw. that is not cumtomaray in sim events as well. A player or the mater can wait with their moves if they like. He does so in this video btw.
He was actually mirroring the top Grandmaster twice, once towards the corresponding table, and once with table 9. Derren probably actually studies his style and tie him up with someone really similar, top chess players have similar opening moves and that way the two table can deviate as late as possible, if that make sense to you guys.
@ShahnamPersia er I meant the trick seems very much like the one from the system... yet unlike 'the system' where he had thousands of tries, he couldn't have tried it more than once here to guess the number of chess pieces left x)
@JeffersonDinedAlone I was talking specifically of "Robert Chan" who is simply the president of the Chess Club at Kings College. Albeit it true Brown could've won a game in a situation like that, I would bet money that he didn't. I think Robert was probably in on it, as he's notwhere near the "chess status" of the other individuals. Even if it weren't the case though, Dan could be fed chess moves by someone backstage. These kind of scenarios are entirely possible, Dan Brown is a magician...
that's only the case if both players are the same color (therefore have the same turn). but what Darren did was make 4 players white (which goes first) and the other side black (which goes second) so that he could literally copy the white players' moves on the black boards and copy the black players' responses on the white boards.
(continued) response before finally responding to whites move. Naturally it would pretty easy for a gm to tell that this was going on as Darren would be constantly passing players without moving (something that is illegal in real simul). 3. The games would be ending two at a time. The players would notice this. Also it was 4 gms, 2 fms, 1 im and a former english junior they would be far more suprised if someone with no rating was able to play evenly with all of them simultaneously
As far as the numbers at the end, it seemed like there was some slight of have have fuckery when he had the guy show it to the room. He probably wrote it down after
+Cellkist He just played 9 masters simultaneously and beat them all as a collective AND predicted the number of pieces left even before the game started. And its Derren..
I saw a simpler way to rig this a decade or two back: the chessboards were arranged in a hotel lobby around a large solid diameter circular column, so no player could see the adjacent games. The trickster walked around the outside, from board to board, and only had to remember one move, because the layout meant that he did not have to separate the players who were playing each other.The other way he made it easy on himself was to have an even number of players. This simplified hustle would not require any chess playing skill whatsoever to "win" half the games against the world's best, and makes minimal demands on memory.
1:59 I love how he says he has been reading all of their transcripts, but he didn't bother learning their names... not that it's important, but still. Makes the lie more believable.
I wonder if any of them found it odd that he'd wait at their board for them to move, and then walk away before moving himself. I imagine yes.
And, if he has to wait for the other player to move, it means he would have to go around 2-3x for every move at least. Probably way more. Which made the whole thing seem really weird to chess pros.
Omg. An ancient Jerry comment on a random chess video! Almost feels like I've found a hidden treasure.
@@TTArt wow that’s crazy actually
Not to say those opposing colors lol
nicee, "have been analysing your gus game for a year, ... what's your name?" xD
hahhahaha so true xD
He said his chess game was shit, yet he can still beat the president of the chess club at London college. Hah. Ok.
You watched the whole video, right?
Josh S Did either of YOU two watch the whole video? At the end of the video he said he was playing one real game at table 9, which we won.
Steven Axe Lol two idiots
Josh S Are you stupid? Jesus.
+Albert Lovejoy No, he's just trying a terrible backtrack.
Chess players hate him, but you can use this one weird trick.
Chess players learned him this trick/ he did a google search and copied their method.
Prometheus4096 What? No... The trick was playing them against each other and beating one of them. Also, I don't mean to be rude at all, but it's 'taught' not 'learned' if you're looking for the past tense of someone teaching something to someone else.
Patrik Manni
Yes. It is an old well known trick among chess players. Has been used several times by correspondence chess players.
And 'to teach' and 'to learn' are two different verbs. No idea why you are confused about that.
Prometheus4096 You said "Chess players learned him...". That makes no sense. It's supposed to be "Chess players taught him..." or "He learnt this trick from...".
Patrik Manni
cool story bro
I think the mistake in the "prediction" is not an accident. The paper inside the envelope had a 6 on the front of it all along. With some excellent sleight of hand, Derren sticks the paper with the rest of the numbers to the piece of paper with the 6 which the chess player is holding. So the piece with the 6 never leaves the man's hand and the 6 is in sight the whole time.
I'm guessing 6 is statistically the most likely number of pieces left on a chess board when a game is over. Derren got quite lucky, because he was only one off. Ofcourse, he would have been REALLY lucky if that player had had exactly 6 pieces left :-)
***** I don't understand why he didn't make the trick with 100% though - there was a game which finished with 6 pieces, he could just use it instead of applying the prediction "6" to the game which finished with 7 pieces.
+Artur Kirkoryan To make it more real and appearing as some kind of an imperfect skill rather than trick
The tables were numbered, he couldn't change the order as he wanted...
My guess is that Derren managed to get Graham Lee on table #1 in on the trick. And he didn't play table 1 v. table 5, he played table 5 v. table 9. So when Derren used sleight of hand opening the letter, Graham didn't protest since he was in on the trick. The mistake at the beginning serves to deflect attention away from Graham.
OK I'm sorry, after looking at the results, it couldn't have been exactly like that. But is it possible Derren somehow brought two games back to Graham--one they played on the table, and another they signaled to each other based on game #9? It's not unheard of for a master to play two games at once, especially when one of them is against the president of a chess club who is not ranked.
He secretly mirrored their moves on a different board. So basically it like the grandmasters are playing them selves.
You can see exactly how he does the numbers trick if you pay close attention when he takes the folded up paper from the chess guy. When he takes it, he hides it behind another folded up paper, and then keeps it hidden between the paper as it is unfolded. It's sleight of hand.
@tassay
You’re right, but the pro’s would understand they were playing a poor game.
But I was mistaken, I understand how he did it, the players did effectivaly play between each other.
Table 1:
memorize player 1’s move
Table 5:
Play player 1’s move
Wait for player 5 to play
memorize player 5’s move
Table 1:
Play player 5’s move
Wait for player 1 to play
Got to the start.
That was great. The moment he said divide them into pairs I got it right away. Freaking genius.
thats a very nice strategy and actually im very impressed
I'd still love to see an explanation for how he predicted the numbers at the end. And I don't believe him entirely about the 9th player.
I would find a task like this incredibly difficult catering to only 2 pairs of games. To do that with four pairs while SIMULTANEOUSLY playing a real game of chess is absolutely stunning. This man's mental capacity is mind-blowing.
Funny how none of the players found it normal for some games to be played with the white and some with the black pieces by Darren. Darren should be getting the white pieces in all games, per normal procedure.
hthought that wouldn't change much. There's a way to transform the boards colours backwards in your brain. Just mirror and flip then invert the colours
@@ComedyPal667
It's not about color, it's about who moves first. White always makes the first move, thus mirroring an opponent against another opponent becomes effectively impossible unless their starting order is also mirrored.
@@jessesipprell8287 riiight, thanks
I promise you they knew. They were just playing along.
I figured out what he was doing as soon as I saw half the players had opposite colors, but the execution and the additional trick of "predicting" pieces left over were excellent showmanship.
I thought about this since this is already done in one of the Sidney Sheldon's Novel
This chess thing was just a snippet of a longer Derren Brown episode. Thanks for the upload!
just a normal guy lieing in the streets 9:37
gn
Dude I love your channel, awesome that you came across the video I'm watching.
6:01 "I don't wanna touch you"
*five seconds later*
Touches arm at 6:06
"I don't wanna touch it" aka the envelope. And he doesn't either (touch the envelope that is). So all is well.
ostkartong I know nothing about magic, but some kinda weird something goes on from 6:18 - 6:21. During that time, he's actually physically holding the papers in his hand, directing how exactly how it's unfolded, etc, using the 6 (the number he got wrong) as a shield. 3 seconds seems like an eternity in the world of sleight of hand. Also, whether he's technically lying is probably completely meaningless because all of that, "As you can see, there are no mirrors," type of talk that magicians do is just a misdirection anyway. Who cares that he never touches the envelope? It seems to have successfully distracted us from the fact that he unnecessarily grasps and spins and unfolds the paper itself, even though the assistant is probably wholly capable of unfolding a piece of paper.
@JDoucette I think the lighting in the room is meant to keep each players attention on THEIR board.
Brown probably payed Chan off here.... Chans rated 1500 and that aint that bad.. to be sure to win derren would have to be around 1700+ and that while remembering all the moves on the other tables. Many players play for years without reaching 1700 + rating so Chan was likely bribed..
Andreas sUND or brainfuked in advance
Probably my favorite Derren Brown. I love proper planning and preparation and the high you get when you succeed, not the recognition you get for doing it but being recognized that you did it. You know what I mean?
We're all adults here right? Fucking brilliant!!!
im not, im 14
Greenzy Then disregard any words that are offensive...😳😉😉
@Rimber6 You don't get it. He never really opened. On the boards where he was white, he played the moves his opponents on the other side of the room played before him.
this could be done better with radio micro-earphone and a computer
computers nowadays play better than top humans, so they can beat average grandmaster easily
get an assistant who would watch through hidden camera, input human moves into computer and tell magician which peace to move and you dont even need to know chess rules
Seems plausible. The only issue is that even an average chess hobbiest can tell they are playing against a computer after a dozen or so moves, let alone grandmasters.
Well, that depends on what you mean by better. It wasn't about beating people at chess most efficiently, it was about what he was able to do by memory.
David Xu then just have a grandmaster or two correcting that in the background as well
Timur Nurmagambetov The point was that he wasn't using a radio or mic.
David Xu What gives the computer away?
Holy smokes, that is a very clever way to simultaneously play nine games of chess -- four against grandmasters -- and come out on top overall.
It's something that I now want to try, as that was just... wow. Clever.
That cringe worthy laugh at 4:29 though
Had to re watch because the ending just blew me away for its simplicity.
This supports my theory that most UA-cam video titles are lies.
(in this one, the lie is that he beats the 9 players- obviously false to anyone who's watched the video)
#MostUA-camVideoTitlesAreLies
He beat them overall in a group. It wasn't through skill but through deceit. That still counts as a win.
Ilysanth Amaranthine The title says he beat 9 players simultaneously. That's a lie. It might count as one win but certainly not nine.
This is impossible to do the way he explained it. From what I could see he started playing as black and opened c5 against whites e4. He divided all of them into pairs, meaning that the other pair across from the "e4-c5"-table have to play exactly the same as the "e4-c5"-table. Let's say he try to copy the e4 move at the other table, and his opponent answers with for example e5, then it's suddenly a totally different game and he's screwed right from beginning.
Exactly!
Its important to also see that this could be done on any number of people at the same time. as long as you can remember 2 digts for each game skipped (the notation of the move)
I dont think there is a pocket trick with the number. It is 2 sided to be sure, 1 number is wrong (which happens to be the game he actually played).
Most obvious explination I can think of is by looking at end game positions of games recorded for that specific player.
5:56
"One of SEVERAL memory feats that I was indulging in"
Cheeky.
@ Schusterlehrling: Okay, if player A plays white against B and black against C, and C opens the game with, say, 1. e4, then A can open his game against B with 1. e4 as well (wonderful trick, I never had figured that out). But from this point on it is simply possible, no: very likely, that the games take different courses. A's problem is that he can't just switch between the boards at will, but has to work them sequentially. So your explanation doesn't work here.
At the same time, it's his turn to play on one of the boards and his opponent's turn to play in the other board. They are using different colors, he's not playing at the same color in both to allow his opponent to make different options.
@Tweakisher no they would eventually play a different move and even if he then went to the other board and play the same move, he would possibly get a different result depending on how far into the game he was going.
@SilentKek It couldn't have been up his sleeve. He only touched the paper to get the optimal dramatic effect. There was no switch.
It's not about figuring out the trick, it's about using his technics, which he also describe in his book; "Derren Brown - Tricks of the Mind". It's about memorising patterns, and how to use them.
I love how he explains the obvious trick but not the one that makes you really wonder.
@BillMan2002 he explains in the video, there is a pattern to each player he goes against, he just repeats another players move against another player, in other words he is a vessel for a chess match between different players.
Whatever move player #1 does, he will do against player #2. the reaction of player #2 he will do against player #1. Then repeat that process so basicly player #1 and #2 are playing against eachother. It doesn't matter what move they do, he will always copy it.
I really enjoyed this. They were actually playing each other, he was merely exhibiting a fantastic ability to remember things. As for the prediction of number of pieces left, that was his magician persona tossed in for fun. He pulled a trick on that one somehow or another, lol.
Each pair is essentially playing each other. He is just moving the pieces for them.
It's part of a TV show, and throughout the show he would call payphones and make them fall asleep. This is one of them.
Having played a lot of chess, and not being too shabby at it, I new his trick the second the cameras showed the boards alternating. I knew at some level he was just mimicking games. Brilliant trick though!
@IEatCray0ns If i recall correctly I think at the beginning of the show, he was a bystander that picked up the pay phone when it rang. He past out like that, and suddenly gained consciousness later on at the end of the show.
i actually explain this trick in full in my blog. but UA-cam will not let me post links for fear of spam. message me if you want to know.
@Darth814Vader keep in mind he claims he was playing one real game of chess, but at the same time he was getting a variety of moves and ideas from grand/international masters. Also, Derren has exceptional memory (the average human can only remember 7 things at once, and he was able to remember 8 while playing a game of real chess). Derren probably has studied chess quite be on par with great players and felt confident in his playing ability.
@ensilver1 I realized after watching this again, that he does keep the matches on opposite sides, and the barriers are in place to prevent them from seeing each other. I had an issue with the fact that he'd have to wait for a response each time before being able to play it on the other board, which could seem strange. Also interesting is the weakest player 'felt' he was of grandmaster material (in the game he really played himself).
It's cutting back to the segment where he was making people fall asleep whenever they picked up a public telephone.
6:17 the moment when he comes back he tug onto the paper, its at this moment he executes a good-ole-magician trick, thus making it seem like he predicted a numbers, the mirror chess setup was a very great system he discovered, that is amazing
@NameMoon I think you're up to something there. Most magician wanted some kind of recognition of magical power that they possess after the performance they did. Otherwise, there is no point of doing these performances.
The reason he gives away the "secret" of his success is because he wants us to think that these were legitimate chess games while in fact each game was all pre-memorized by each players.
Yeah, good touch on the number "6" mistake. It makes most of us a believer.
I would love to hear him say "These are not the droids you are looking for."
I agree. The last guy, Robert Chan is president of king's college London, chess society, so he is the head of a club or something of the sort. So that case, you have to be looking at him being somewhere around the 1600-1800+ range ELO. Derren Brown must be somewhere around there to beat him.
@NightHawk0085 That leaves the problem of Chan responding differently than the player he is supposed to mimic, leaving an entirely different boardstate in just a few turns.
@franky3923 It's not misleading because he is moving the chess pieces himself. Just because he took advice from someone doesn't mean he doesn't play.
Also the the player giving the simultaneous exhibition makes his move immediately after the player made it.
I realised he was going to do that as soon as I saw the setup of tables.
Just need a few hours to work out how he got the number right.
This was a clip from a TV show, that would be the next segment of the show or even an advertisement I believe.
@TheDeranged123 The point was to win >50%, so if one opponent forfeits, then it doesn't matter if Derren loses against the other one.
it takes skill to remember all those moves, and derren brown has that skill
This trick has been around for a long time (or so I've gathered from reading the comments), but watching it the first time it pretty funny.
you can say whatever you want but i think this is brilliant
In a way Darren is like a referee in the middle. A variant known as Blind chess takes this where there are 2 players and a referee between them. Each player only sees a board with their own pieces on the board and makes a move. The referee makes this move on the middle board which has both white and black pieces on it. The ref goes over to blacks table and than Black moves. Hard to checkmate because you can only see your own pieces and hope for the best...
As for the prediction of the pieces left...anytime the magician touches the thing to be revealed before it's actually been revealed (6:18) then you can bet some sleight has been done.
Make no mistake, they did to. This is a very well known and easy to think of trick that everyone who has played a decent amount of chess would have both though about themselves or heard about.
Everyone in the room knew what was going on, the only thing I'm surprised about is that the GM's were pretty decent at pretending to be fooled.
I figured he was doing that when I heard the comments of the players. But damn that's some impressive memory
@zreeper No it's possible, but here is how it works. So he goes to table 1 and lets the other player go first. Then he doesn't make a move and walks to the next table pretending he's thinking. Once he gets to table 7 he goes first using the table 1's move. He watches table 7's responding move and walks to the next table. Once he get's back to table 1 he uses table 7's responding move. Repeat!
"as for how i predicted the number of pieces on each board....i genuinely cant remember" win
as for the numbers, I think there are 2 strong possibilities. 1. He chose random numbers and tried to make them fit, but failed. 2. he did something when he helped the chess master open the package that he gave him.
i knew it was going to be having them play each other but the numbers, thats the trick i really want to know
@13rAdJa13 The confusing part isnt how he did it, its how he knew the numbers of the pieces left at the end of each game before the games started (the envelope). No part of him copying the other players' moves explains how he knew this. Can you?
He just remember the move someone plays and repeat it on the other board. Then, after his opponent replies with his own move, he repeats that move on the other board, and so on.
For example, his opponent starts with e4. He doesn't have to respond immediately, so he just moves on. Then, when he gets to the board that's paired with the board in which the player started with e4, he also plays e4. And then, he copies whatever his opponent's response is back on the other board when he gets there.
LOVE darren brown, wish his show was still on
@zreeper The reason this is possible to do using a computer against someone over internet is because you can change the situation you want against a computer by just moving pieces how you want, but you can't do that in a real game.
White is better simply because it has the first move. With accurate play black can turn the tables or can allow white to have a strong center in exchange for something else, like a strong king side attack or something. Different opening variations make these kinds of trade offs all the time. But at the start white having the first move is an advantage and that is bound to influence win percentage overall.
He actually remebers the number of pieces, but the paper is pulled form his sleeve so its probalby written after the game
it wont be on the opposite board. it got taken, so he is going to take it on the other board. the opposing players were playing different colors.
The secret to this one is ripped straight out of the seminal text on mentalism by Corinda
One way he could have done the trick with the number is to simply guess (with the help of some analysis like "what opening will he most likely play etc.) and if the number is close enough (one wrong) reveal it, otherwise look for nine other players and do the whole show again. He used this "trick" in another episode when he convinced several people they'd guess the right horses and only showed the one person who won on tv.
@jjphysstud It's most likely that they know there is some trick going on, but it doesn't necessarily mean they are in on the whole thing.
Actually, he does not make tzhe moves in sequence.
And btw. that is not cumtomaray in sim events as well.
A player or the mater can wait with their moves if they like.
He does so in this video btw.
In the beginning ,I did notice that some players play white, the others play black, but I've never thought of this trick! Derren, you are genius!
He was actually mirroring the top Grandmaster twice, once towards the corresponding table, and once with table 9. Derren probably actually studies his style and tie him up with someone really similar, top chess players have similar opening moves and that way the two table can deviate as late as possible, if that make sense to you guys.
@ShahnamPersia er I meant the trick seems very much like the one from the system... yet unlike 'the system' where he had thousands of tries, he couldn't have tried it more than once here to guess the number of chess pieces left x)
@JeffersonDinedAlone I was talking specifically of "Robert Chan" who is simply the president of the Chess Club at Kings College. Albeit it true Brown could've won a game in a situation like that, I would bet money that he didn't. I think Robert was probably in on it, as he's notwhere near the "chess status" of the other individuals. Even if it weren't the case though, Dan could be fed chess moves by someone backstage. These kind of scenarios are entirely possible, Dan Brown is a magician...
He is talking about losing a piece of his at one board while it survives on another.
yeah it doesnt make sence to me, the guy pops up at the end of the video but i guess he was apart of the video but later on
The game at table 1 and 5 ARE the same game. The Boards will be identical. The key is that player 1 is playing white and player 5 is playing black.
I agree, that is why I wrote that he did not beat them in chess, but with the prophecy (i.e. the numbers each had left after the game had finished).
that's only the case if both players are the same color (therefore have the same turn). but what Darren did was make 4 players white (which goes first) and the other side black (which goes second) so that he could literally copy the white players' moves on the black boards and copy the black players' responses on the white boards.
@Rimber6 Yes, everyone would respond differently, but that is irrelevant because he plays that response on the other board.
(continued) response before finally responding to whites move. Naturally it would pretty easy for a gm to tell that this was going on as Darren would be constantly passing players without moving (something that is illegal in real simul). 3. The games would be ending two at a time. The players would notice this. Also it was 4 gms, 2 fms, 1 im and a former english junior they would be far more suprised if someone with no rating was able to play evenly with all of them simultaneously
As far as the numbers at the end, it seemed like there was some slight of have have fuckery when he had the guy show it to the room. He probably wrote it down after
wow what an old video archive
@PhilosophicalPsycho I think he said he genuinely can't remember. Which would make a bit more sense just to add some extra awe to the show.
I have a feeling he just wrote the number down after the games when he already knew the result.
If I had a billion dollars, I'd spend 100 mill to have Darren brown teach me for 3 months. The rest I'd donate to charity.
+odee There are many better teachers of Chess then Darren.
I hope you meant teach you at chess, otherwise this comment is irrelevant.
+Cellkist He just played 9 masters simultaneously and beat them all as a collective AND predicted the number of pieces left even before the game started. And its Derren..
Olivia liv It was a trick dear.
@cheetah219 actually he remembered 4 things and played fifth game on his own, he remembered 4 positions and played the fifth game.