Nice. My first thought when I looked at the position after White's 9th was that it would be great if Qe7 worked, but I didn't have time to think it through (and didn't think it did work).

Throwing this post in mostly so that I remember to see how this ends; both sides to be a little short on analysis for the critical lines here. (Can't White just block the check by returning to e5 after Qxf4? And the threat of d4 seems to force Black's hand...)

Maybe it doesn't work 10.Qxf4 Bd5+ 11.Kf1 Nf6, 10.Qxf4 Nf6 and even 10.Qxf4 0-0-0 are all worth considering

What's wrong with 10 d4. Bd6 11 Qe2? If white just castles and and gets his pieces out it seems like he has a good game. The f4 pawn is weak, black will have tough time mobilizing his K-side pawns and white has a good 4-2 Q side pawn majority. Longterm plan for white will be to drop a knight on e5 putting pressure on the f4 and c6 pawn.

I would think that would be a clearly advantageous position for white and in addition it should be a position type any white King's Gambit player should be comfortable with as they often occur.

I don't know about that.

IF white can castle AND develop then sure but in the meantime, after black plays 11 ... G5, the F4 pawn is hardly weak and black's kingside attack looks to be more relevant than any longterm considerations.

After 11...g5 I think 12 h4 works. Just my gut feeling but 12...g4 13 Ne5 and the c6, f4 and g4 pawns are en prise. I haven't looked that closely but I can't see how black survives that.

I really feel like all these spoilers are about how bad I am at chess, lol

Then I'm sure you'll feel even better about a direct response. Aren't Malkovich games fun?

10.d4 seems like the natural move here as it is uncomfortable with black's bishop on c5 preventing my king from castling to g1.

Maybe you're right. My first thought was that
13 ... F3
14 GxF3 GxF3
15 NxF3 BG3+

just had to be good for black but I don't see anything convincing after KF1.

Crazy position ...

More or less forced. 10.d4 I did not anticipate it now makes castling for White possible and create a protected square for the Knight to go to block a potential discovered check. However If 11. Qxg7 I still plan to play 11 ... 0-0-0. If 12. QxR Nf6 13. Qg7 Bc4+ and White is in deep ****. I suspect 12. Ne5 might be tried which I will meet with 12.... Bd5 protecting the KQ forking square, pinning the knight and putting more pressure on the potential castled king which would now also have an open file on it. Any other 12th move by White that is a developing move will be met by Nf6 and black has a better game imo.

I actually think what I least want to see if White trade the Queen for both rooks. Then he can castle ill be down [2] in material and generating an attack will be difficult.

I think black is overlooking the immediate 11...Bc4+ after Qxg7.

12. Kd2 loses to Bb4+ (not 12. Qe2+ as after Kc3 13. Rb8/a5 white has b3 creating a square for the king) 13. c3/Nc3/Kd1 gets mated by Qe2.

So white has to try 12.Ne5 Qh4+.

13 g3 fxg3 14 Qd4 is devastating as far as I can see

13 Kd1 is likely the best try. 13...Qf2 runs into 14. Nd3. I think 14...Bxd3 15 cxd3 0-0-0 16. Qxh8 f3 might work for black.

A 17. Nc3 fxg2 18. Re1 Nf6 19. Qg7 Rg8 20 Qh6 g1(Q) and black can't take the queen as Rxg1 is mate.

B 17 Re1 fxg2 18 Be3 Qxb2 and White is winning.

I might have missed something though as this was done without a board and just from looking at the last diagram

it is 13 g3 fxg3 14 Qxg3 Qxd4 in my line above

First time I've looked at this game because the diagram errors put me off for a while.

I see your point about an immediate Bc4 although I dont see the harm in delaying it for a move. What can white really do to stop it? Ne5 maybe although Qh4+ followed by a bishop rampage looks strong in reply. It's not as if he can just grab the pawn and move back either there's nowhere for the queen to go!

I think his idea of 0-0-0 makes more sense though. Gets the rook into the attack, and protects the back rank a bit more.

Realistically white has to just avoid the bait here, move Qe2 and hope he can develop a piece or two to help defend. Black is looking pretty solid to me at a glance at least. A perfect example of why development helps

Qe2 looks obvious, since if the white queen moves off the e-file, a discovered check is available to black by moving the light squared bishop.

I looked at 11.Qxg7. A line I didn't like was 11....Nf6 12.Qxh8 Kd7 13.Qxa8 Bc4+. Anything but 14.Ne5 is a forced mate. 14.Ne5 may have a forced mate I don't see, but in some lines there are forced draws.

OK so White pussed out of the more insane lines and I guess is planning to castle to saftey and possible win an end game. I suck at end games and I also feel with some trade downs I'm in a huge disadvantage because it will be really hard for me to hold my f4 pawn and c pawn. I have some evil pawn storm intentions if 12. 0-0. My idea will be to push the h pawn and use that f4 pawn to an advantage in prevent any ideas of g3. If h3 is used as a defense I'd like to try and set up a knight outpost on g3 that will be very difficult to trade off and even if it is accomplished hxg3 creates an open file for the rook and an open diagonal for the bishop on whites h pawn and probably leads to some kind of bad stuff. I'd like to play h5 immediately but I don't want to ruin my own castle and encourage White to castle 0-0-0 then I'd like be boned. Nf6 is almost all scenarios is something I am going to do anyway I'll probably meet a 0-0-0 by obviously getting a rook and queen to the open file etc.

I'm behind on development and I may not be able to castle in the near future. I'll go ahead and castle now.

Black has not even sacrificed a pawn but he is in a hurry to force things. I'd be surprised if 12.-0-0 wasn't the soundest and Black seems fine to me, even White manages to round up the f4 pawn B has 2 bishops and activity. Two interesting Malkovich games going on (and one boring, guess which).

Heh, even the boring game isn't so bad.

But yeah, I'm definitely enjoying following these games as well. Thank you to everyone participating.

Just don't have enough time for the pawn pushing ideas, my king is in too much jeopardy itself and all the pawn pushing will give me no place to go.

This may all be obvious or wrong, but I want to practice my evaluation and avoid doing my actual job for a few minutes.

Okay, black's got a two-piece development lead and the bishop pair. White's goals have to be to develop, to keep the the remaining center pawns on the board to keep the bishops from having even more dominance and to win the f4 pawn before black can do anything with his development advantage. In the meantime, white also has some awkward piece placement that could lead to tactical issues: Queen is loose and exposed to discovered attack, the queen and rook on on the same diagonal and potential skewer victims, and the exposed king through the a7-g1 diagonal.

So if I'm white, I've got to find a good spot for my undeveloped bishop and knight. If the knight goes to c3, that makes it even easier for black to rip open the center further with c5. That only leaves d2, but that leaves nowhere for the bishop to go. So b3 seems really attractive to me. It guards the key c4 square, it leaves the c-pawn mobile (a pawn chain of a2-b3-c4-d4 seems like white's best setup here). The knight probably is better on c3 (guarding some key light squares to make up for the missing bishop) eventually, so the idea plan for white is b3, Bb2, c4 and Nc3. Since this isn't a four-moves-at-a-time variant, let's see if black will let him do that.

After 13. b3, white doesn't have any obvious immediate tactics. He'll probably just continue developing with a rook to b8, d8 or e8. All of those are positionally problematic but not immediately threatening for white, so white could continue with his plan after one of those.

Black can play c5 immediately as well but there's just no way to stop that. 13. b3 c5 14. dxc5 Bxc5+ just wastes even more of white's time, so it'd have to be 13. b3 c5 14. Bb2 and then if cxd4 then 15. Nxd4 pushes the white bishop to d7 (d5 just gets it booted by c4, which white wants to play anyway). Then I think exchanging queens is better for white despite being down the bishop pair, because after Qxe7 Bxe7, white can play c4 and complete his development plan while black will need a few tempos to redeploy his pieces to useful spots.

13. b3 c5 14. Bb2 c4 looks kind of annoying. 15. Nd2 threatens that pawn, but maybe 15. ... Rc1 16. Ne5, and then black has to waste resources protecting that pawn and black has reached his goal of clogging up the center of reaching that goal to restrict the usefulness of the bishop pair.

Okay, work was successfully avoided for 15 minutes. Now what this analysis either have huge tactical holes or bear no resemblance to what happens on the board.

a major problem with putting the B on b2 is that Black can try to put his knight on e3 imo

I think Black is doing well anyway (though I kind of wanted to see a ...g5, ...g4 line) but if I was White I would just play Nc3 and worry about whether ...c5 was a problem after it happened. maybe Ne5 is best though intending Bxf4

Moves that stand out to me are c4, Nc3, and Re1. I like c4 as it takes a way d5 for black's pieces. However it doesn't develop a piece plus I may have to spend another move playing b3 so my queen doesn't have to keep guarding it.

Nevertheless Nd5-e3 can become a problem. Then black also has Ng4-e3. I just realized Nc3 helps with the black knight getting to e3, since Nc3 guards the queen on e2 (if the knight ends up on e3, white plays Bxe3 and black moves the bishop on e6 creating a pin).

Anyhow its uncomfortable being behind in development so I like Nc3 over c4. Also, I don't see anything bad for white after 13. Nc3

Not considering Ne5 seems bad. Nc3 might be better but Ne5 would be a candidate for me. Also white hasn't given any analysis to what happens after 13...c5.

My thoughts exactly! 13. Ne5 threatens to win f4 and deserves a close look.