Logic games

Logic games, abbreviated LG, and officially referred to as analytical reasoning, is one of three types of sections that appear on the Law School Admission Test (LSAT). A logic games section contains four 5-8 question "games", totaling 22-25 questions. Each game contains a scenario and a set of rules that govern the scenario, followed by questions that test the test-taker's ability to understand and apply the rules, to draw inferences based on them. In the words of the Law School Admission Council (LSAC), which administers the test, it "measure[s] the ability to understand a structure of relationships and to draw logical conclusions about that structure".^[1] Like all other sections on the LSAT, the time allowed for this section is 35 minutes. While most students find this section to be the most difficult section on the LSAT, it is widely considered the easiest and fastest to improve at once the right strategies are learned and employed.^[2]

What makes the games challenging is that the rules do not produce a single "correct" set of relationships among all elements of the game; rather, the examinee is tested on their ability to analyze the range of possibilities embedded in a set of rules. Individual questions often add rules or modify existing rules, requiring quick reorganization of known information.

The underlying skill tested by logic games is important to the practice of law in two aspects. First, American law often requires parties to prove essential elements of various multi-part tests to prevail on procedural motions or on the substantive merits of claims or defenses at trial. In other words, parties must present evidence to prove facts which go to each essential element to the satisfaction of the finder of fact (judge or jury). The parties' lawyers must work with imperfect information which may not evolve or develop as expected, and must be able to smoothly pivot between arguments and strategies as the record develops, especially during trial. That is, they must quickly think of another way to plug the facts as they develop into the elements the law says they must prove. Second, at trial, evidence is often inadmissible for one purpose against a party but may be admissible for another purpose, or admissible only against one side and not the other. The lawyers and the judge must evaluate admissibility in real time as evidence is introduced into the record, keeping in mind the relationships of each witness to the various parties and other witnesses and the potential purposes for which the evidence could be considered by the finder of fact.

In 2019 the LSAC reached a legal settlement with two blind LSAT test takers who claimed that it violated the Americans with Disabilities Act because they were unfairly penalized for not being able to draw the diagrams commonly used to solve the questions in the section. As part of the settlement, the LSAC agreed to review and overhaul the section within four years. In October 2023, it announced that the section would be replaced by a second logical reasoning section in August 2024.^[3]