I'm getting a kick out of this thread because, having hardly played chess since age 12, this game instantly reminded me of games in the middle school library.
It seems like there's broad agreement on skill level.
Yeah, just tried a fool's mate! It didn't /quite/ work, but pressing on still led to a very early mate, after dealing with an inconvenient pawn. (I think about 15 moves total?)
I settled for the second trick newcomers learn -- forking the Queen and the Rook with the Knight. Easy win being up a Rook and Pawn to a Knight, with the black's King uncastled and in the open.
I expected it to play like Ed's Chess on DOS, which I always had trouble beating. IIRC that engine looks 3-4 moves ahead usually, but 6-7 moves ahead when it needs to. No idea how big the equivalent JS would be.
Looking ahead more moves requires zero more code -- depth is a loop variable.
Not sure if I agree completly, but since you can win in under 10 moves simply focusing on an attack in the king I know what he means (wasn't quite a fools mate, but couldn't protect the Kings side)
I think that a 12 year old would play Mord reckless and would make more obvious mistakes. I think this is at the level oft a self taught novice that only played against another self taught novice (funny enough I was thinking of when I player chess against my friends when I was 12...) good times