thumb|right|upright=1.5|Teeko game board
Teeko is an abstract strategy game invented by John Scarne in 1937 and rereleased in refined form in 1952 and again in the 1960s. Teeko was marketed by Scarne's company, John Scarne Games Inc.; its quirky name, he said, borrowed letters from the games Tic-tac-toe, Chess, Checkers, and Bingo.
Standard Teeko
Standard Teeko is also known as Teeko 44 Positions and is a game for two players.
Gameplay
One player conceals two pawns in their closed hands, one of each color. The other player selects one hand and plays the color that is revealed. Nonetheless, Guy L. Steele Jr. solved the game (i.e., showed what must occur if both players play perfectly) via computer in 1998 and found neither player can force a win.
Variations and history
According to Scarne, the idea for Teeko started when he devised a winning strategy for Nim; since it had sixteen distinct starting moves, it was relatively easy to memorize how to counter each one; to solve this issue, he later developed the game Scarne in the early 1930s to have 252 distinct starting positions, which later was withdrawn and rereleased as Scar-Nee (1950) and Scarney (1961). Scarne had 5000 copies of Scarne printed in 1934 but only sold 300 after a month of live demonstrations at Macy's; to prevent his mother from learning it was not successful, he destroyed the remainder by fire. Scarne ended up winning all ten matches, but did not receive publicity for this feat afterward.