Well, Canadian teams compete for the World Series, don't they?
What one considers a player and what not is a bit ill-defined, and different games might use different criteria. But for the case of Xiangqi it isn't really that relevant, because it is so China-centered, and hardly anyone plays it ouside China and Vietnam. So it would never have a claim to the predicate 'International', no many how many players there are on a World scale. Likewise for Shogi; virtually no one playes that outside of Japan. The Dutch Shogi association has some 56 members, only about half of them active.
Orthodox Chess is not concentrated in any single country, or even continent. So the name International Chess is deserved there, even if it would not have the largest number of players on a world scale. As I said, it is not important how popular it is in China alone, that is only one county.
Well, Canadian teams compete for the World Series, don't they?
What one considers a player and what not is a bit ill-defined, and different games might use different criteria. But for the case of Xiangqi it isn't really that relevant, because it is so China-centered, and hardly anyone plays it ouside China and Vietnam. So it would never have a claim to the predicate 'International', no many how many players there are on a World scale. Likewise for Shogi; virtually no one playes that outside of Japan. The Dutch Shogi association has some 56 members, only about half of them active.
Orthodox Chess is not concentrated in any single country, or even continent. So the name International Chess is deserved there, even if it would not have the largest number of players on a world scale. As I said, it is not important how popular it is in China alone, that is only one county.