If you mean this for "classical algorithms" then sure.
But in the context of AI "classical algorithms" is more like logic programming (eg Prolog) or similar in the "cognitive programming" vein that led off this discussion. I don't think these types of classical algorithms are competitive.
The rest is basically regular programming in that its largely bound by how well the programmer models. For a large number of things, the scope of what a human can consider lags an optimization process. In chess, it at first seemed like this might be the case there too, but latest performance points to maybe not this time.
I think the distinction is how the looked-up knowledge is integrated.
Determining what the legal moves in a state are, and what state results from a given move, is not something the AI would learn by itself, but is programmed into the system by a human expert.