I still don't get it.
Look, a game is a tree*, right? The root is the initial position,
below it one node for each possible starting move, one below each of
these for the possible replies. At the bottom of the tree (trees grow
downwards in CS and math) are the end nodes, which you can label "win"
and "loss". Or "tie", "draw", "both lose", "both win", "win but your
opponent doesn't lose", if you really want to.
The thing is, since we are talking _abstract_ games here, what really
matters is the shape of this tree. Whether you describe the game in
terms of moving pieces, connections, capturing, or changing rules, all
that is just flavour. Far from unim****tant, but nonetheless it's the
tree that makes the game.
Moreover, observe that from any position in a game tree, there's a
complete game that starts right there. All games are already a vast
collection of subgames. Even for a game with a comparatively modest
tree such as Chess, it is already the case that you never play the
same game twice.
So what exactly are you trying to achieve?
Are you trying to make chess into a game which has a theoretically
infinite number of moves at one point in the tree? There are many such
games, like Eleusis and Mind Ninja, but it is neither necessary nor
sufficient to save the game from being solved, or even giving humans
the advantage. It won't get it on TV either.
Nor do the fact that big games include very many other games as their
subgames matter much. They have to stand on their own merit. I don't
feel that Magic: The gathering is an all that varied experience, for
instance, although the number of possible games probably dwarfs even
Go.
When I play abstracts rather than CCGs, it's not because they are more
varied, but because the variation I find there (indeed, the variation
in the ways a single good game can play out) is of a more interesting
kind. I suspect other abstract players feel that way too, especially
those of the traditional abstracts, so I don't see Hera****an Chess
conquering the world any time soon.
(* technically a directed acyclic graph. Whether the rules say so
explicitly or not, all rules have an equivalent of the fifty-move
rule, because players aren't machines.)
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