May 01, 2025
Author's Commentary #420:
Time to talk about Chapter 420: Haste makes waste.
And here we have the second major item of procrastination for this arc. Unlike the Alouette game, this one I managed to write in a sitting once I finally got the motivation to write it.
This game was really satisfactory because despite the masked man not playing anything crazy, he plays a Reversed French Defense, which leads to Alexandre overthinking things and being caught off guard, leading to his loss. And yes, this game was played against Chess.com's 3200-rated level 25 maximum engine bot. I originally was going to have the masked man play a Bongcloud-esque opening originally, but due to burnout, I ended up going with this one due to it being under 35 moves, and I'm glad I did as this was a very satisfactory and unique game.
Now for my overall thoughts on round 7 as a whole. To be frank, I feel the men's side of it was probably the worst part of it. While Round 7 was easily the round I did practically no storyboarding and preplanning for like the other rounds, I feel I managed to do most of the games in the women's section well. The Japan vs Estonia match was notable in the fact that I managed to get it all out in time. I also feel the other matches such as Noa vs Xiao Lin, Kaylee vs Heather, and the Croatia vs New Republic of Peonia matches were all amazing. The Ecuador vs Czechoslovakia match and obviously the Japan vs France match are clearly some of the lower points.
In regards to Japan vs France, that primarily came about solely because I wanted to showcase Alexandre properly since he is in fact a maestro. The problem was that once I committed to it, I suffered from both writer's bloc and burnout in regards to writing said match. This also led to the arc having jumbled pacing in it's latter half, though I feel that I at least managed to weave it well into the upcoming mini-arc with the Mexican team. And for more good news, round 8 has been planned for months, and with all the games planned out, things are looking good for it. In fact, every match from round 8 onward was initially storyboarded meaning I have a clear vision for everything unlike with the round 7 arc in the story.
That's all for this commentary. I hope you enjoyed it.
