Notes:

  • Changed date format from UK (DD/MM/YYY) to YYYY/MM/DD (ISO order)

If you like the appearence (it's based on chess.com) you can get the scid pieces/squares here

See here for details on how to use them

What is Caïssabase

When I got back into Chess a year or two back I couldn't find a decent free regulary updated database of Chess games.

There are some good ones out there like Kingbase and Millionbase (not updated anymore).

Why the name Caissabase?

Caissa is the Goddesses of chess and database - hence Caissabase

What is in Caïssabase?

Currently 4.02 million games

I started from the following databases/sources.

  • Millionbase
  • Kingbase

I then merged in all of the TWIC back issues up to the date on the archive as well as all the master games from pgnmentor.

If you haven't seen it check out The Week in Chess, Caissabase would be a lot less current without the weekly games files they put out.

If you have anything I'm missing or interesting links, tweet me @caissabase

What about curation?

Glad you asked. Roughly I followed these rules.

  • Removed all duplicates
  • Removed all games with less than 5 moves
  • Aimed for all games to have one (or both) players at least master strength
  • Fixed names and event spellings where possible
  • Inserted ELO's where known
  • Inserted extended ECO opening codes

Release Schedule and Versioning

Versioning

Each release uses the date (in ISO format so YYYY-MM-DD i.e. 2019-05-30 is 30th of May 2019)

Release Schedule

On average I'll be aiming for once a month which include the previous months TWIC etc.

I'll announce each new release on twitter @caissabase

What software do I need?

Scid vs PC

It's available for Linux, Windows and MacOSX so you should be covered unless you are on BeOS ;).

Scid may also work but I built the database on ScidVsPc.

How to use ScidVsPc is beyond the scope of this project but YouTube has some good tutorials.

If you use something other than Scid (e.g. Chessbase) you can export the Scid files back out as PGN and reimport into whatever you do use.

The option is under Tools - Export all filter games - Export filter to PGN

If you have applied a filter make sure you reset the filter before exporting.

It'll be a big PGN file (about 3GB) but once imported you can delete it.

Privacy/Cookie Policy

I don't set a cookie, I don't use any kind of tracking beacon.

I don't fingerprint your browser or any of that junk.

The only log I have of your visit is what Apache stores and that log is deleted every 24 hrs.

Can I give you money?

Nope - kind of you to offer though, The only cost to me of this project was registering a domain name as I already have servers

If I take money I'll feel obligated and this is just a small monthly task I do for myself anyway.

Legal/Copyright

Where I live facts are not copyrightable, Chess moves played in a game are facts.

You'll notice there are no comments on any of the games as comments are copyrightable.

I've given some thought in the long term to allowing annotated games from end users with a suitable copyright assignment but frankly I'm not a strong enough player to evaluate if that commentary is good or bad.

Downloads

Caïssabase
2019-09-08
(SCID Format - 441MB)

You will need ScidVsPc to open this file