Basics of Game Theory

Welcome! I'm thrilled to dive into the world of game theory with you today.

Before we build our roadmap and jump into the strategies, I'd love to know what brings you to study game theory today, and whether you have any prior background in economics, math, or formal logic.

I'm complete beginner looking to learn for fun!

It is wonderful to have you here! Since you are a complete beginner learning purely for fun, we are going to keep things incredibly intuitive, visual, and grounded in real-world scenarios. Game theory is essentially the study of how people make decisions when their choices affect each other.

Your path

Simultaneous Games and Payoff Matrices

The Classic Prisoner's Dilemma

Understanding the Nash Equilibrium

Sequential Games and Decision Trees

Let's kick things off with our very first subtopic: understanding what game theory actually is and how it shows up in everyday life. At its heart, game theory is the study of . That is a fancy academic way of saying: my best move depends entirely on what you decide to do, and your best move depends entirely on what I decide to do. We are locked in a mutual dance of decision-making.

To see this in action, let's visualize a simple, classic dilemma. Imagine two rival food trucks, Taco Town and Burrito Bandits, deciding where to park on a long beach every morning.

If they both park right in the center, they split the beach customers 50/50. If one parks in the center and the other stays at the far end, the center truck steals almost all the customers. Their payoffs are directly bound to each other's decisions.

A three-panel beach layout showing two food trucks in center, asymmetric, and opposite end positions with customer movement vectors.

I've started generating a visual simulation of this food truck dilemma to help show you how their physical positions on the beach dynamically alter their customer share.

Are you ready to explore the basic building blocks of any game—the Players, Strategies, and Payoffs?