The Game of the Century

Why It's Famous

A 13-year-old Bobby Fischer, playing Black in a regular round of the Rosenwald tournament in New York, produced one of the most celebrated queen sacrifices in chess history against a strong adult master more than a decade his senior.

17...Be6!! offers the queen for what looks like completely inadequate compensation — a bishop and a pawn — but it wins the exchange of the queen for a swarm of minor pieces and pawns that grind Byrne down over the following 25 moves, ending in a small, elegant rook mate.

The game instantly established Fischer, still a young teenager, as a serious future contender, and it remains one of the most anthologized games in chess teaching for its demonstration that material alone doesn't decide a position — piece activity and coordination can be worth far more.