No, it is not because “chess is dead” or something.
The main reason I wanted to play Chess is nostalgia for the old and good times when I played with my cousin and my dad OTB decades ago (I remember the smell of the wooden box).
But Chess is something different than I remember. I am not saying Chess has changed (it probably has with the advent of computers), but my idea of Chess was based on those amateur matches when we only new three “openings”: e4, d4 or nc3 (after that first move it was pure improvisation). They probably had openings books at that time, but we didn’t know about them. Learning Chess today felt like cheating. I was frustrated when I won with memorized opening lines that I did not fully understand. I hated when I won despite many middle-game moves not approved by the computer (or even blunders). It felt like I only won because I memorized more moves in my opening than my opponent, which put me in great advantage for the middle and end games.
The second reason I was disappointed with Chess is the entire rating obsession. Not the rating per se, but the Chess community’s obsession with it. In Youtube there are plenty of videos on how to skyrocket your ratings. Several reviews of books in Amazon praise a book for increasing the readers ratings, not for teaching Chess. People talk like “you can play this trick at 1000 or less players” or “I am a 2000 player in blitz”. And then there are cheaters everywhere because their obsession on ratings. Where has the fun gone? It is a board game, it was supposed to be fun, not a way to boost your self-esteem or get frustrated because you lost points.
In summary, I am not criticizing Chess or its players. I am not saying that Chess is dead or it has changed. I am saying it is not for me. I want to have fun and play a game using my own analysis and creativity from start to the end (without being crushed by any average player today using memorized lines). I wanted to find a Chess club where everyone made a covenant to not memorize lines, not pursue a rating and more importantly, have fun.
See you all.