Talk:L game

I do have a commercial version. I bought it in the Netherlands some 14 years ago, but I haven't seen it on sale ever since. The set consists of a flat tin box 140&times;140&times8 mm, with pieces made of plastic sheet embedding a magnetic material, so they stick to the box. The pieces store conveniently in the box after play.

The bit about lateral thinking and violating assumptions sounds like blurb. As an abstract game it's not very special, and it can be analyzed and played perfectly even without computer aid: I figured it out 14 years ago.

&mdash;Herbee 2004-02-11

Technically, it's correct, the game was actually created to demonstrate lateral thinking. However, whether it actually does manage to demonstrate lateral thinking is another much more questionable issue... Κσυπ Cyp    18:25, 11 Feb 2004 (UTC)

After all this, now I wonder. Do you mean that inventing the game is intended to demonstrate lateral thinking by DeBono? Or that successfully playing the game requires lateral thinking on the players' part?

&mdash;Herbee 2004-02-13

As far as I remember hearing from years ago, the game was designed to require lateral thinking to play well. Not sure if I read it somewhere, or was told it. I remember there were cardboard L-game pieces included with some book. (Considering that it's trivial to write a program that shows that memorizing a few positions is sufficient to force a draw, I'm not completely sure the goal was met, though.) Κσυπ Cyp    17:21, 14 Feb 2004 (UTC)

The game was designed to require lateral thinking to play well, and to develop lateral thinking skills in the learning player. See de Bono's "The Five-Day Course in Thinking" (1968) 81.86.148.191 20:01, 13 July 2005 (UTC)

It was indeed introduced in "The Five-Day Course in Thinking", but in the section on Strategic Thinking, there was no claim by de Bono that lateral thinking was involved here - that was discussed in its own section elsewhere in the book. 80.189.216.53 (talk) 18:07, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

The design of the game was not related to lateral thinking. The aim of the game was to achieve complexity with a minimum of rules and pieces, to create the simplest possible real game. "Real game" meaning there was no guaranteed strategy for the starting player to force a win. This contrasts with chess where complexity is achieved with many pieces and many rules. If the game got used later on to illustrate some thinking principles(not specifically lateral thinking), fine, but that was not the original design aim. AVH, 14:53, 20 August 2007 (UTC) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Special:Contributions/ (talk)

When I wrote a computer adaption of the L game, I remember finding out that if the players were allowed to move the neutral pieces on their first move, it was possible for the starting player to win on his/her first move, without the opponent ever getting the chance to make a move. Do I remember this right? &mdash; J I P | Talk 13:00, 12 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Not exactly. Examine the 15 possible end positions.  In only 3 of these (last two in the middle row, second to last in the first row) is one of the Ls in the original position, and in none of these three is a neutral piece in a corner position.  So the first player could put the second player in a compromising position where the second player could force themselves to lose by a foolish neutral piece move blocking their L move, but I don't really count that as a first player win. --AaronRosenberg 20:38, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Edward de Bono was trying to create a "simple game" - not a game that demonstrates lateral thinking. In "The 5 day course in Thinking" - page 120 of the hardback published by Penguin Press in 1968, it states: "This game was designed by the author because he enjoys playing games and yet hates to concentrate on a large number of pieces. The intention was to produce the simplest possible game that could be played with a high degree of skill." There is no ISBN number in this publication.

While the L Game was later proved mathematically to be impossible to win or lose against a perfect opponent, there is still a way to simulate a near-perfect (but partially fallible) computer opponent and therefore enjoy the game - awaiting the random mistakes of the opponent. A computer (web browser) based version of the game was distributed on the Cort Lessons CD - see http://www.edwdebono.com/debono/cortcd1.htm or http://www.state-of-the-art.com.au/debono/games/lgame.htm for the game. This version of the L Game was playable at different levels of computer opponent ability - a Javascript and a VBscript version was produced for this CD. (StephenSmith (talk) 02:35, 8 May 2008 (UTC))

Starting position(s)
This might not matter at all but attempting to be correct The photo and diagram showing the start position are actually mirror image of each other's position not the same position. I know game play would be exactly the same but chess mirror imaged would also play the same but is generally considered wrong. Edward de Bono's web site doesn't comment if one is right and the other is wrong but the picture on his site matches the position of the photo here not the diagram; so the pieces look like an "L" not a mirror image of one. I don't know if it's mentioned in the rules with the game of anyone who owns one. If this is so the diagram may need to be flipped.

It maybe should be mentioned that the mirror image start position is either acceptable, wrong, or simply not mentioned by de Bono but that game play would be the same anyway. Carlwev 01:00, 17 June 2007 (UTC)


 * ✅ (I flipped the image November 2012.) Ihardlythinkso (talk) 05:33, 11 May 2014 (UTC)

Unsourced material
The following is unsourced information:

While this is interesting, we can't use it unless you provide a source. Also, none of this is really trivia, as trivia by its definition is "unimportant information" - it therefore shouldn't be in a trivia section but instead the information should be incorporated into the main article. - Tbsdy lives (formerly Ta bu shi da yu) talk 12:27, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
 * The Finnish computer magazine MikroBitti once held a competition about creating a computer version of L game. Readers could write their own computer versions of the game, on Amiga, Atari ST or PC computers, in a programming language of their own choosing, and send them in to the competition. The magazine then ranked them according to presentation, features, skill of computer opponent (if available), and general "fun factor". The winning game was written on the Amiga.

Offensive strategy
Hi, I am a first year Bachelor student and our group is currently doing L-game for our propaedeutic project. We are trying to find an offensive strategy but the literature we found so far has very little information regarding that. Our best approach is to make a move that limits the options of the opponent as much as possible when it's their turn, as mentioned in the article, to occupy 3x3 of the board. Any thoughts on how to place the neutral pieces? Noovil (talk) 14:01, 31 May 2017 (UTC)