The battle between man and machine has reached a stalemate, after the eight-match Brains in Bahrain chess duel ended in a draw.

World champion Vladimir Kramnik of Russia tied 4-4 with the chess program Deep Fritz, and picked up more than $800,000, according to the BBC.

Had Kramnik won the tournament his prize money would have been $1m, but he had the consolation of knowing that he did better than his predecessor.

Garry Kasparov was defeated by IBM's Deep Blue supercomputer in New York in 1997, amid accusations that the chess program made it seem as if Kasparov was playing a new opponent each time.

Kramnik admitted that he was not prepared for some of Deep Fritz's opening strategies, and said that if he was not able to catch it out early it was hard for him to win outright.