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Title: Games of Strategy, Second Edition
ISBN: 0393924998
Author:
Avinash K. Dixit
Susan Skeath
Publicate Date: 2004-04
Publish: 2004-04
List Price: $108.75
Average Customer Rating: 4.0
Format: Hardcover
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Amazon Lowest New Price: $59.12
Amazon Lowest Used Price: $58.71
Amazon Merchant Price: $71.85
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| Customer Review: |
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1: good nontechnical introduction
This textbook is a good nontechnical introduction. To understand the intended audience, you need to read the preface of this book. the authors intended this book to be a textbook for freshmen and sophomore who are not in a particular discipline yet. Therefore, (1) the book is intended for that level, and (2) it takes a non-disciplinary approach, in the sense that it is not written for economics, or political science or business majors per se. Instead it is written for all of them, but in a more general way. Also, the authors say the book sort of replaced 'thinking strategically' by Dixit and Nalebuff, since the latter was more of a trade book, not a textbook. Therefore, owning both books could be a bit redundant, but it could also offer a nice pairing and complement each other.
If you are looking for a mathematical approach, this is probably not the book for you. If you know nothing about game theory and just want to read up on it, go with 'thinking strategically' instead of this because this is a textbook. If you want a relatively non-technical introduction as part of a course or for self-study, or if you have another textbook that you find too technical, this would be a good book for you.
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2: Too light on detail
Usually, attending class is required to find out what the professor is going to focus on in the book. Using this book, attending class was required because the book is so shallow, the lecture actually goes into more depth then the book.
This is a very introductory text book, and at times can be frustrating trying to go the next step that is needed for comprehension of a concept. If you are looking for an introduction to Game Theory concepts and examples of the introductory games, this is a good book. But once to try to go the next step and start analyzing the boundary cases or a more complicated game, this book will not have the answers.
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3: Great book
Pros:
* Well written
* Plenty of Examples
* Exercises are generally well worded and defind
Cons:
* Explanations can get a bit lengthy (2+ pages)
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4: bad book.....
The author is a fine economist, but he's written a lousy textbook. The only positive is that it's easy (indeed, almost to the point of being simplistic) so the uninitiated can learn from it rather readily. But it takes away any positive it provides by being rather nonstandard in its terminology and notations. Plus, I doubt anyone taking a college-level game theory class would be so untrained so as to need this sort of babying. Finally, the contents don't justify the sky-high price.
If you need a good game theory text, buy Gintis for the intro. students and Osborne and Rubinstein for the reasonably advanced. These are affordable paperbacks that I think are as good as any hardcover. Don't waste money needlessly.
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5: Excellent introduction to game theory
This is a fantastic introduction to game theory. I'm in a graduate-level game theory course with a much more confusing textbook, and this one has enabled me to learn the concepts more clearly. Once I study the text and examples in Dixit & Skeath, I'm comfortable moving on to the harder problems in my other text. I definitely recommend this book to anyone interested in learning game theory -- you'll even get a few good laughs out of some of the examples and the authors' jokes.
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