THE VIDEO SHELF · combinatorial game theory
HACKENBUSH: a window to a new world of math
Owen Maitzen's animated hour-long introduction to Hackenbush, a simple combinatorial game, and how its strategy leads to surreal numbers and the roots of the number system.
Why HN readers recommended it
HN recommends it as an accessible, well-visualized entry point to Hackenbush, surreal numbers and their link to Nim.
This is a summary from the source dataset, not an endorsement by Hacker News or the video creator.
Video & recommendation details
- Creator / channel
- Owen Maitzen
- Topic
- combinatorial game theory
- Format
- explainer
- Level
- intro
- HN recommenders in dataset
- 3
- HN mentions in dataset
- 3
- Recommendation years in dataset
- 2022–2025
These counts and years describe the included Hacker News records; they are not YouTube views or the video’s publication date.
From the original HN conversations
Excerpts from the recorded comments. Follow each source for the full comment and surrounding discussion.
Nim is, in fact, a proper subset of Hackenbush, a game extensively studied by Conway. I found the following video extremely useful and well-visualized: [VIDEO]
lblume on Hacker News · 2025-02
In Transfinite NIM (the game, not the programming language)All numbers are fictitious :) Though, I think "games" built on surreal numbers are akin to these. [LINK] An accessible intro: [VIDEO]
rini17 on Hacker News · 2022-09
In Indefinite and Fictitious NumbersHACKENBUSH: a window to a new world of math [VIDEO] Thanks for the blogpost, I think you will like this above SOME3 entry. Owen Maitzen committed suicide which is mentioned in the following video. The Endless Universe of "Bean and Nothingness" [LINK]
nthingtohide on Hacker News · 2024-12
In Numbers Are Leaves
Summaries, classifications and recommendation records are from the HackerTube source dataset. Read about this library and its limitations.