Abstract strategy game

A smaller category of abstract strategy games manages to incorporate hidden information without using any random elements; the best known example is Stratego.

Indeed, Bobby Fischer promoted randomization of the starting position in chess in order to increase player dependence on thinking at the board.

Good players are the ones who find the most difficult puzzles to present to their opponents.Many abstract strategy games also happen to be "combinatorial"; i.e., there is no hidden information, no non-deterministic elements (such as shuffled cards or dice rolls), no simultaneous or hidden movement or setup, and (usually) two players or teams take a finite number of alternating turns.

Chess is believed to have originated in northwest India, in the Gupta Empire (c. 280–550),[9][10][11][12] where its early form in the 6th century was known as chaturaṅga (Sanskrit: चतुरङ्ग), literally four divisions [of the military] – infantry, cavalry, elephants, and chariotry, represented by the pieces that would evolve into the modern pawn, knight, bishop, and rook, respectively.

New inventions such as printing technology in the 15th century allowed for mass production of game sets, making them more accessible to people from various social classes.

[16] [17] In the British Museum are specimens of ancient Egyptian checkerboards, found with their pieces in burial chambers, and the game was played by Queen Hatasu.

The earliest written reference to the game is generally recognized as the historical annal Zuo Zhuan[21][22] (c. 4th century BC).

[23] Englishmen Lewis Waterman[24] and John W. Mollett both claim to have invented the game of Reversi in 1883, each denouncing the other as a fraud.

In terms of measuring how finite a mathematical field each of the three top contenders represents, it is estimated that checkers has a game-tree complexity of 1040 possible games, whereas chess has approximately 10123.