Are Those Real? The Naked Truth about Fake LSAT Logic Games
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We are often asked whether or not we use real LSAT games in our class (the answer is YES! The vast majority of the questions featured in class, homework, and from our books are 100% real LSAT questions!), and the question has been asked so many times that the question now reveals more than the answer itself. Someone, at some point, was teaching the LSAT using fake games, and those students were not happy. Whoever that is/was, shame on you – may your pencils be always dull and your erasers leave annoying streaks on your paper.
But, the truth is that our site does sport a rather large number of fake games. What’s up with that? You thought Manhattan LSAT keeps it real; grade A, pure 100% USDA LSAT beef. We do, I swear, but we do like to dip our toes into the world of synthetic LSAT stimulants for extra practice. There are two big reasons for us having fakes. One is that we want to write games that are harder than the usual ones out there so we can push our students’ brains past their usual limits. But the most important reason we have these games is to hone our teacher’s skills. Every one of our teachers must write a logic game as part of his or her training, along with many other curricular and pedagogical challenges (up to but not including having to walk across a bed of coals while reading aloud a reading comp passage).
There are a few interesting challenges to writing an LSAT-like logic game. The first is to write one that is like a game one might see on the LSAT but without actually mimicking a game (it wouldn’t be much of a challenge to simply replace all the nouns and verbs of an existing LSAT game). Along with developing an innovative but realistic game, our teachers-in-training must try to achieve “duh-ness” with their questions. What’s “duh-ness” you ask? Have you ever been working on a question, spending tons of time on testing out answer choices, and then when you get to the right answer and finally see its rightness you say – perhaps aloud – “duh!”? There it is: pure duh-ness. It comes from the fact that the logic game section is designed to test your ability to make inferences, not your ability to do trial-and-error. Lawyers, as far as I can tell from various movies and run-ins with the law, are not doing a lot of trial-and-error when developing legal strategies. Consider switching counsel if you’re on trial for grand larceny and your lawyer says “Hmmm, what sort of defense should I use with this client? I’m feeling lucky, let’s spin the strategy-wheel-of-fortune and find out!” Since the logic games section is testing your ability to make logical inferences not spin your wheels, the right answer is generally something you could reach through a step of logical moves. Thus, the other challenge for our teachers is to avoid writing a game where a ton of trial-and-error is needed to arrive at the right answers, and instead you can solve them through a slick combination of moves.
It sounds like our teachers are getting a lot out of this, but what’s in it for you? Go right ahead and solve our games if you dare – some of them are pretty tough (I’m particularly proud of Jambalaya – one of my gruesome concoctions). In fact, right now we’re running a series where we show a game in two forms – a simple and complex version – to highlight some of the typical twists that the LSAT throws at us. If you want to stretch yourself, try to win the prize for best explanation on our forums, or, even better, write a kick-ass duh-full extra question to one of our games (if you post it on our forums, we’ll test it out in our lab). But, in the end, treat our games like a tasty yet questionably nutritious food – they’re the ice cream of LSAT prep. Real LSAT games and a hearty strategy guide are the meat of your LSAT prep. They are the most duh games around, and they are the meat and potatoes of our curriculum.
If logic games are your bugaboo, consider taking our Live Online Logic Games Intensive Course. This six session course focuses solely on the games section of the exam and is, like all Manhattan LSAT courses, taught by a 99th percentile instructor.