I've read a bit about the various ways of categorizing games (symmetric, cooperative, zero-sum, etc), but I haven't figured out the proper way to classify games with the following characteristics:
- A secret (sometimes ordered) set of game-pieces is selected from a larger, finite set of pieces.
- The composition of the secret set does not change during the game.
- The "guesser" makes a series of suggestions about either some or all of the set.
- Guesser is given feedback about their suggestion being either: entirely correct, partially correct, or entirely incorrect.
- First-order logic can deduce the composition of the secret set once enough information exists, but the real skill in the game lies in knowing which guesses to make in order to maximize the information learned per guess.
- "Success" in the game is generally measured by how few suggestions need to be made.
- Making a poor/incorrect guess does not end the game (for this reason, a game like Minesweeper doesn't really qualify); it just increases the number of guesses needs and, thereby, lowers the player's score.
Off the top of my head, I know of a few games which (although, on the surface, seeming very different) all fall into this classification:
- Mastermind
- Battleship (actually two instances of this game happening in either direction)
- Clue
Does anybody know of many others?