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## Free Online Game Theory Course from Stanford

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5 replies to this topic

### #1Dan Violet Sagmiller  Members

Posted 08 January 2013 - 09:08 AM

My apologies if this is not allowed here, but I'm only posting it because I think people here will want to use it.

I figured I would let people know about Coursera's free online college, but only because they just started a free Game Theory course.  Its free, no ads or junk mail etc...

Its not game theory in the sense that they are talking about Video Games or Board games, but they still discuss strategy, and this is something valuable for AI, and game design in general, and how to measure/define different strategies in certain cases.

https://www.coursera.org/course/gametheory

As a game designer, I still found it quite useful.

Again I'm sorry if this is viewed as spam, and I wouldn't normally post something like this, unless I thought it was really valuable.  They just started, and I think the latest you can join is Jan 20th and play catch-up.

They are talking about things like Nash Equilibrium, and how to determine the best strategy if you know all of your opponents potential strategies.    Since it builds into tables, its pretty easy to apply these in an AI setting, but excellent to keep in mind for game design, so you can have these types of things to work out.  Its purely educational.

Moltar - "Do you even know how to use that?"

Space Ghost - “Moltar, I have a giant brain that is able to reduce any complex machine into a simple yes or no answer."

Dan - "Best Description of AI ever."

### #2WildField  Members

Posted 08 January 2013 - 01:45 PM

From the info on the site it seems that there are no people who have designed successful games or design games as their full-time job among instructors. So it's difficult to tell if that course has any practical use in game design whatsoever.

Edited by WildField, 08 January 2013 - 01:45 PM.

### #3Legendre  Members

Posted 08 January 2013 - 07:48 PM

From the info on the site it seems that there are no people who have designed successful games or design games as their full-time job among instructors. So it's difficult to tell if that course has any practical use in game design whatsoever.

Its a course on mathematics (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_theory), not a course on game design (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_studies).

I am surprised they got professors to spend time to shoot videos on what is very very basic mathematics! A proper course on Game Theory should go through (at least a simple version of) the proof, via Brouwer's Fixed Point Theorem, that every finite game has at least one mixed strategy Nash equlibria.

P.S.
Moderators should consider moving this to the lounge as "Game Theory" is not very relevant to game design. The word "Game" in mathematics is often confused with the colloquial meaning.

Edited by Legendre, 08 January 2013 - 07:50 PM.

### #4Reavermyst  Members

Posted 10 January 2013 - 03:37 PM

Kudos on the course link buddy, I'm signing up!

### #5WavyVirus  Members

Posted 10 January 2013 - 05:37 PM

I am surprised they got professors to spend time to shoot videos on what is very very basic mathematics! A proper course on Game Theory should go through (at least a simple version of) the proof, via Brouwer's Fixed Point Theorem, that every finite game has at least one mixed strategy Nash equlibria.

These courses generally aren't intended to be rigorous degree-level courses, and don't lead to a recognised qualification of any kind. They tend to be pitched at the interested, educated lay-person, and cover the material in a way which is usually somewhat light on the mathematics, but deeper than your average Discovery Channel documentary. Alternatively, think of it at the level of a university elective (an introductory-level class you take for semester in a subject outside of your main degree subject). To be fair, the syllabus does at least mention Nash equilibria.

I can vouch for the Coursera system - I'm currently taking a course in astronomy, which I have found to be excellent so far. There are a couple of hours of video lectures per week, and well thought out homework questions. It covers the material in some depth, but there is simplification or hand-waving from time to time when maths beyond basic calculus is involved. I think there is a lot of buy-in to Coursera from reputable universities as is allows the lecturer to interact with a large number of "students" at once (I believe some of these courses have subscriber bases on the order of tens of thousands).

### #6Reavermyst  Members

Posted 10 January 2013 - 07:35 PM

It's a good way to get your feet wet, that's for sure! Sad to say i didn't score very high on the first set of questions. I don't really have the mindset for this degree of statistical analysis as of yet. Then again, it's only week 1 and there are 7 more weeks for me to understand the information.

Edited by Reavermyst, 10 January 2013 - 07:35 PM.

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