Genetic algorithm
Board games are a very relevant part of the area of genetic algorithms as applied to game theory problems. Much of the early work on computational intelligence and games was directed toward classic board games, such as tic-tac-toe, chess, and checkers. Board games can now, in most cases, be played by a computer at a higher level than the best humans, even with blind exhaustive search techniques. Go is a noted exception to this tendency, and has so far resisted machine attack. The best Go computer players now play at the level of a good novice. Go strategy is said to rely heavily on pattern recognition, and not just logical analysis as with chess and other more piece-independent games. The huge effective branching factor required for finding high quality solutions heavily restricts the look-ahead that can be used within a move sequence search.