Bridge Baron v. 15 -
software by Great Game Products

Available at £59.95 from the Mr Bridge Mail Order Service Tel: 01672 519219 (code SW16)

I have always been suspicious of bridge software in the past but Bridge Baron has been in development for over forty-one years, devised by an expert in artificial intelligence and a keen bridge player, and I must state at the outset that it is the most comprehensive and sophisticated bridge program that I have ever seen. Where to start is the problem. You can configure the software to play almost any system and any gadget too. You can state what leads and signalling methods you want to play and whether you want to be 'aggressive' in your overcalling or not. You can play with the computer as your partner or you can sit back and let the machine take over. You can ask for an explanation of anybody's bid if you are not sure what it means and you can even ask for advice when you are in a pickle yourself. (That advice was sometimes a bit wayward but not significantly so.) What is more you can set the standard of either your partner or the opposition.

You can either choose one of two billion random deals, or enter a deal yourself to see whether you made a pig's ear of that tricky 3NT hand by getting the computer to play it for you. I fell in love with Bridge Baron when I input this hand:

A Q 7 6 4     10 7 5 4     8 7     7 3     K 5     Q 3 2     A 4     A Q J 6 4 2

I had played in 3NT after East had opened 1 and I received a low diamond lead. Thinking that the best bet was to hope for the K to be onside, I won the lead and played the K to the A in order that I might take the club finesse twice. The king was onside but singleton, and I ended up going three down. Spades were 3-3 so clearly the contract could have been made, but Bridge Baron duplicated my play exactly.

There's loads more too. You can practice any of the bidding conventions and you can sharpen your declarer play by testing yourself on one of the 168 problems, which are not at all trivial. Also, it is great fun to take part in one of many pre-played tournaments which had been held in the USA - so you might be playing in a pairs event which happened twenty years ago. You play up to thirty hands at a time and score against the original field.

I am sure there's stuff I haven't even found. You can play on the Internet if your operating systems uses Windows; there are also instructions on how to play and if you get it wrong, the computer says 'no'.

Are there any things I didn't like about this program? Well, I didn't like the way it thought for up to two minutes - super level - and then thought for another two minutes at the next trick when nothing had changed. Towards the end of play it generally speeded up, but the waiting did sometimes get a bit tedious. I also found it a bit difficult playing the hand for my partner should he - sorry, 'it' - be declarer, because everything was turned upside down so that South should play the hand. So what East had originally bid was now bid by West, if you see what I mean. Who cares! I thought it was a great piece of software and its originators should be proud. It runs on Mac OS8.6 or later, and any Windows OS.

Dave Huggett

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