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Game Theory Lab
Prisoner's Dilemma
Cooperate
Defect
Cooperate
3 , 3
0 , 5
Defect
5 , 0
1 , 1
NASH EQ.
Row player (blue) vs Column player (red). Green cells = Nash Equilibrium.
Player 1 Strategy
Player 2 Strategy
Game Theory — Nash Equilibrium & Strategy
Game theory studies strategic interaction among rational agents whose outcomes depend on each other's choices. This simulator lets you construct payoff matrices, identify dominant strategies, and solve for Nash equilibria in both pure and mixed strategies. Moving to extensive-form games shows how backward induction finds subgame-perfect equilibria in sequential decision problems.
What you can do in this simulation
- Enter custom payoff matrices for two players and identify dominant strategies
- Solve for pure-strategy Nash equilibria highlighted directly on the payoff grid
- Compute mixed-strategy equilibria for games with no pure Nash equilibrium
- Step through backward induction on a game tree for sequential games
- Iterate the iterated elimination of dominated strategies to simplify complex games
Concepts covered
Nash equilibrium · dominant strategy · Prisoner's Dilemma · mixed strategy · backward induction · payoff matrix
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