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Music: Monsieur Miaow by Shane Ivers – https://www.silvermansound.com

This is the fifth and final episode playing, and hopefully defeating the all new cat meme chess bots unleashed by chess.com in 2023!

Mittens is an enigmatic and super-cute kitten with an ELO rating of 1! However, over the past four days playing against Scaredy Cat, Angry Cat, Mr Grumpers, and Catspurrov, I wonder whether there is more to Mittens that meets the eye! Each cat-bot complained to Mittens about me about the game, and I wonder whether she is not, in fact, the boss. A final boss so to speak!

Mittens responds to e4 with the Sicilian Defense – very professional. I decided to use the Grand Prix Attack (1. e4 c5 2. Nc3 Nc6 3. f4). I like the Grand Prix as it isn’t difficult to play, and the main idea is relatively compatible with the Vienna. An early f4, expansion on the king-side, and launch an early attack! I had great success with this overall strategy against Catspurrov yesterday.

Perhaps I was blinded by that success as I tried to do a similar tactic of sacrificing queen-side material to gain tempo in moving my knight, bishop, and queen to attack Mittens’ king, which had castled king-side. And I thought it was working! Mittens, however, was simply toying with me and had seen through the attack from the beginning.

I thought that I had a mating attack but hadn’t recognised that Mittens’ had strategically placed her queen on the long dark square diagonal. On move 15, I triumphantly captured Mittens’ fianchetto bishop and to discover in horror that Mittens captured back with her queen (15. Bxg7 Qxg7).

At this point, I lost all hope in the game. In fact, this attack never even had a chance [-12]. Mittens spent the next 15 moves ruthlessly hunting down my pieces and flexed her superiority with a knight checkmate in the centre of the board! Good game, I guess? I’m scared!

Game on chess.com: https://www.chess.com/analysis/library/4fGkdRhNQE

[Event "vs Computer"]
[Site "Chess.com"]
[Date "2023.01.05"]
[Round "-"]
[White "vitualis"]
[Black "MittensBot"]
[Result "0-1"]
[Timezone "UTC"]
[UTCDate "2023.01.05"]
[WhiteElo "1381"]
[BlackElo "1"]
[TimeControl "1/0"]
[EndDate "2023.01.05"]

1. e4 c5 2. Nc3 Nc6 3. f4 {Sicilian Defense: Grand Prix Attack. Mittens is
playing a very solid defence $1 Let's see how she goes against the Grand Prix.}
3... g6 4. Nf3 Bg7 5. Bc4 e6 6. O-O Nge7 {At the beginning of the middle game,
we're balanced [0.00]} 7. Qe1 O-O 8. d3 d5 9. Qh4 $4 {[%c_effect
h4;square;h4;type;Blunder;persistent;true][%c_arrow
c4b3;keyPressed;none;from;c4;opacity;0.8;to;b3;persistent;false][%c_highlight
b3;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;b3;persistent;false] This was a blunder
[-4.7]. Mitten's saw through my plan to sacrifice material on the queen-side to
launch an attack on her king, and knew it was doomed...} 9... dxc4 $1 {[%c_effect
c4;square;c4;type;GreatFind;persistent;true]} 10. f5 $6 {[%c_effect
f5;square;f5;type;Inaccuracy;persistent;true][%c_arrow
d3c4;keyPressed;none;from;d3;opacity;0.8;to;c4;persistent;false][%c_highlight
c4;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;c4;persistent;false]} 10... exf5 11. Bh6
cxd3 12. Rad1 Qb6 13. cxd3 Qxb2 14. Ng5 $6 {[%c_effect
g5;square;g5;type;Inaccuracy;persistent;true][%c_arrow
b2h8;keyPressed;none;from;b2;opacity;0.8;to;h8;persistent;false] I mistakenly
thought that I had a mating attack and didn't recognise that Mittens' queen is
now on the long dark square diagnonal...} 14... Qxc3 {[%c_arrow
c3h8;keyPressed;none;from;c3;opacity;0.8;to;h8;persistent;false]} 15. Bxg7
{[%c_arrow c3h8;keyPressed;none;from;c3;opacity;0.8;to;h8;persistent;false]}
15... Qxg7 {And here I realised all hope was lost - this attack never had a
chance [-12]} 16. Qh3 h6 17. Nf3 fxe4 18. dxe4 Bxh3 {Mittens is ruthlessly
hunting down my pieces $1} 19. gxh3 Rad8 20. Rc1 b6 21. Kh1 Rd3 22. Ng1 $2
{[%c_effect g1;square;g1;type;Mistake;persistent;true]} 22... Qe5 23. Rce1 Nd4
24. h4 Rd2 25. Re2 Rxe2 26. Nxe2 Qxe4+ 27. Kg1 Nxe2+ 28. Kf2 Nf4 29. Re1 Qg2+
30. Ke3 Ned5# {[%c_effect
g8;square;g8;type;Winner,e3;square;e3;type;CheckmateWhite] Mitten flexes on me
with a knight checkmate in the middle of the board, avenging her meme cat
friends...} 0-1