I can imagine that this class runs a lot more smoothly in-person than it does online. Dr. O'Neill seemed lost at times and his best lecturing days are probably behind him. The course covers game theory and its applications in politics, which is definitely interesting.

The class' saving grace is from the TAs. Laura was extremely helpful and was probably the only reason I managed to pass this class. She and the other TAs essentially ended up teaching the class themselves, as a majority of students came into discussion completely lost.

The midterm and final exams are supposedly graded on a curve, but as far as I know, this is BS. The exams themselves were made challenging due to the fact that they included questions from random examples given by Dr. O'Neill, which didn't have much to do with game theory. There were also questions based on Dr. O'Neill's personal opinions, which were probably not appropriate for a class such as this.

Here's my advice. Go to TA office hours every week. Stay on-track with homework and pay attention during discussion. Spend a ton of time reviewing the slides before the exams. Finally, don't take this class if you're not a Pol Sci major or you aren't interested in game theory. You'll regret it.

Barry O’Neil is many things: A myth, a meme, a nice guy, an actual wizard of game theory (not a joke look him up)... a good teacher— unfortunately— is not one of them. Barry uses creative but convoluted examples to explain a lot of otherwise easy concepts and many things get lost in translation. The assignments however, and the actual content of the class, are straightforward and easy. If your TA has any sort of brain, this will be an enjoyable class (despite Barry’s interesting teaching antics) that’s totally possible to get an A in. A lot of people took Barry the wrong way and assumed he was trying to be malign somehow when in reality he was teaching the only way he knows how. Furthermore, he was always accessible and more than happy to answer questions in his office hours. In other words, he puts in the work, is a genuinely nice guy, and a game theory legend, but sometimes can explain things the wrong way. Is that a reason not to take this class? I don’t know, you tell me.

I’d be happy to take another class with Barry again.

Honestly, Barry is a bit quirky? He's a pretty fun guy and I enjoyed my time in the class and in the active group chat, to say it was a fun class due to the people in it.

But it was messy, our first midterm really took us by surprise as everything he says is free game; did you zone out during his talk on the Galapagos? Too bad, now answer this question on this specific thing that was only mentioned once. And we would host zoom sessions as a study group thing but some students had no work ethic and copied others' work. I enjoyed these zoom study group session things since some students explained the course material in a way that made sense to me but that was ruined. Anyways this class is kinda hard when it comes to the lectures and what information to know but the material, when explained by TA's or other students, is actually do-able.

His grading scale is also weird, I can't even explain it but if you do well in the homework and the midterm but fail the final he'll take that into account and make sure you come out with a good grade- is what he said but honestly, spring break has passed and I still don't have my grade for this class.

And the TA's are great, they did most of the teaching. oh and not to forget william spaniel, best youtube channel

but if you're wondering if this is a hard class then the answer is yes and no, exams are open book and the Ta's are always willing to help but the exams are...different :)

NEVER, EVER TAKE THIS CLASS WITH PROFESSOR O'NEILL. He is very unclear during lectures and you are often left confused at the end. I took this class online during the pandemic and he would often make mistakes on his slides confusing students, and he change his mind about what we should care about for the midterm and final. ALSO, THE FINAL WAS A MESS. He didn't teach us half of the things that were on the final study guide so students were scrambling for help from TA's and O'Neill himself the day before the final exam. The final didn't end up being that bad but if you can, do not take this class with Professor O'Neill.

Barry's lectures confusing at times. I passed the class thanks to the TAs who simplify the games much better than the professor can. Despite this, Barry does put passion into his lectures just has difficulty articulating the subject. Midterm was fairly straightforward, as well as the homework assignments.

Barry, bless his soul is a really funny professor but is terrible at teaching since he is so disorganized. Thank god for TA's like Michael who really help.

I can not stress this enough, Barry is the nicest professor I have ever had the pleasure of learning from.

However, he can not teach in an understandable or concise manner. He's fun to watch but the only time I ever learned anything was in my TAs section.

Barry is a nice professor and cares very much about his students. However to say he is disorganized and aloof is an understatement. His lectures are basically ramblings about random topics sandwiched between actual course material. When he goes over how to solve a game he often gets distracted or jumps to another topic which leaves the class more confused. His slides are a jumbled mess and its hard to really discern what they are saying. Even Barry admits he does not do a good job writing the presentations. The area you will get any clarity is in section where the TA will go over sample problems and give out a handout that breaks down the problems and concepts step by step. However not all the TAs are of good quality and sociability. My TA Yana Otlan was excellent about clarifying problems , and admitted that if you found Barry confusing you should take Kathy Bawn's PS30. Tamar was a other good TA , has she created review sheets for the exams. Aresiny is the worst TA, and my TA, told my section to avoid his reviews to prevent getting more confused.
The exams like his powerpoint where a jumbled mess that where literally written the day they were administered. The Midterm especially contained numerous mistakes which caused him to revise the exam while people were taking it, and he literally changed one of the questions after a sizable crowd of people finished and left. The actual game questions where pretty straight forward but the "conceptual" / multiple choice section was something out of left field. They asked about some of the most random diatribes he had in class, and I attended every single lecture. As of right now Barry has still not submitted the grades to the registrar, because he claims he made a mistake while attempting to submit them. If you want to take PS 30 and listen to random stories about Durians, bird courses, and other mundane topics with game theory sandwiched in between take this course. If you want to get game theory delivered in a more orthodox way I suggest you take Kathy Bawn or Michael Chwe.

Don't get me wrong, Barry is a sweet old Canadian guy who is extremely knowledgeable in game theory. However, he is also one of the most disorganized lecturers that I have ever had here at UCLA. Every lecture, I walked out of his class much more confused about the material than when I came in. He frequently jumps around between slides and even in the middle of doing example problems, which made it very difficult to even know what he is talking about, let alone understand the material. Another part of his disorganization is that he literally procrastinates more than the students. As of right now, the deadline for posting grades has passed, but they are still not up. Also, the midterm was written the day of the exam and had so many careless mistakes, but the class has this weird policy where you can't ask clarification questions during the exam. The actual problems on the exams were fairly straightforward if you took the extra time to learn the concepts yourself (because you probably couldn't understand them from class), but don't get me started on the mostly irrelevant multiple choice section that includes questions on the most random anecdotes and phrases that me mentioned throughout his ramblings in class. Despite all these issues, some youtube channel called game theory 101 saved my life in this class because my TA, Arseniy (the Russian guy), was pretty much useless compared to the other TAs. If you are stuck taking this class with Barry (really don't do it though), do not enroll in Arseniy's section. From my friends that had Yana and Tamar, I heard that they are much more helpful.

Terrible lecturer. TA Yana and AAP PLF's are the only reason I understand anything in this class. Lectures are pointless because you leave more confused than when you walk in. Professor O'Neill is a cool dude, but that is about it. He is awful as a professor, but truly does care about his students.