Infinite cyclic impartial games (Q1589503)

The authors investigate the generalized Sprague-Grundy function for combinatorial games on locally path-bounded infinite cyclic graphs. \textit{C. Smith} [J. Comb. Theory 1, 51-81 (1966; Zbl 0141.36101)] had noticed that a transfinite generalization of the remoteness function could be used to determine optimal strategies for combinatorial games on arbitrary graphs. This function was further investigated by \textit{A. S. Fraenkel} and \textit{Y. Yesha} [J. Comb. Theory, Ser. A 43, 165-177 (1986; Zbl 0622.05030)] for the case of finite cyclic graphs. In general, Smith's function takes transfinite ordinal values. The authors of the paper under review say that ``it is easier to compute with finite than with transfinite ordinals (p.~14)'', therefore they try to find a class of (infinite) graphs on which the generalized Sprague-Grundy function takes only finite values. They show that for every locally path-bounded graph there is a generalized Sprague-Grundy function with finite values.