Anatoly Karpov vs Garry Kasparov, 1985 World Chess Championship, R16

Note: This game (Karpov–Kasparov 1985 Game 16) has its full editorial coverage in the dedicated page at karpov-kasparov-1985-game-16, which discusses the famous Octopus knight on d3 — the defining positional sacrifice of the match. The PGN here is the auto-imported Lichess record of the same game; the canonical Caissly article is the hand-written one.

Game 16 was the turning point of the 1985 rematch. Kasparov, playing Black, planted a knight on d3 that controlled the dark squares around the white king for the next seventeen moves. The “octopus” analogy — coined in post-game commentary — referred to the knight’s ability to attack pieces on every direction from d3 while being nearly impossible for White to dislodge.

The full editorial commentary lives at the link above.

Opening context

The opening sequence runs 1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 e6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nc6, after which the players entered the middlegame proper.

See also

For more on this game’s protagonists and theory, see Anatoly Karpov and Garry Kasparov.

Match notes

This 1985 World Chess Championship game sits in Karpov–Kasparov rivalry. Master-level chess of the period was published in tournament bulletins, magazine annotations, and — for the most-studied games — in published opening monographs by the participants and their successors. This game is preserved in the open historical record and can be replayed in full above.