useR! 2026

rgamer: A package to help students learn game theory using R

8 Jul 2026, 16:00

2h

Poster Poster

Speaker

Yuki Yanai (Kochi University of Technology)

Description

We have developed rgamer, an R package for learning and applying game theory. The goal of rgamer is to support both teaching and learning by enabling students to explore game-theoretic concepts and instructors to demonstrate them effectively in R. The package not only solves standard models such as two-person normal-form games, but also provides visualizations that highlight key structural features. In addition to computing analytical solutions when available, rgamer offers numerical solutions for games in which closed-form solutions are difficult or impossible to derive. For example, users can define a normal-form game, display its payoff matrix, and compute pure- and mixed-strategy Nash equilibria. The package also visualizes best-response correspondences in two-person normal-form games and allows users to simulate repeated play. For extensive-form games, rgamer draws game trees, performs backward induction, and identifies subgame-perfect equilibria. It further includes tools for solving one-to-one and one-to-many matching problems. By automatically solving games under analysis, rgamer reduces the computational burden of game-theoretic modeling. This enables students to focus on interpretation and intuition rather than mechanical calculation, and relieves instructors of the need to devote substantial class time to solution techniques, giving them greater scope to develop conceptually important topics.

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