5 things you will learn from video games

Hand-eye coordination and decision-making

Imagine your brain lifting weights in a gym — yeah, that’s what happens when you play video games. The most noticeable enhancements are better motor-visual coordination and the ability to make decisions faster. Video games are nothing but a huge, very complex groups of algorithms. It doesn’t matter what kind of decision you have to make. “Which combo should I use? Buy extra ammo now, or wait? Should I go left or right?” With every selection, you practice quick decision-making and learn from your mistakes. And you can easily practice your hand-eye coordination playing very dynamic games — especially first-person shooters.

Foreign language

I think everyone would agree that the more contact with a language you have, the faster you learn it. It’s best to be attacked with that language from all directions. How to do it? I would recommend going abroad for a few months and trying to assimilate with the locals. If that is not possible for now, you can always sit in front of your TV and play games. Seriously. There are usually at least a few languages to choose from in most titles. If you know the basics of a language of your choice, I believe you can beat any game (even those with thousands of lines of text) with a little help of a dictionary (Google Translate).

Finance

Fans of MMO and strategy games should have it covered the most. Personally, I learned a lot about finance in a game known as Lineage II. I played it for more than two years and it taught me to buy and sell — always at a profit. I used to buy all available raw materials in town in order to lift the prices to the sky. I would sell all of my character’s equipment, just to buy it back later — with a profit. I would bargain and look for any opportunity to earn as much as possible based on the difference in prices. And let us not forget that games themselves are quite expensive, especially on consoles. Financing your game collection requires careful planning.

Field orientation

Since the first 3D games players had to learn to go in the right direction. The best examples are of course games with open world — the less invisible walls and corridors, the easier it is to get lost. Add to that a dense forest or an urban maze of alleys and streets. Nowadays most games offer detailed maps and GPS, thus making exploration easier. And as we speak about exploration — I wrote something about it shortly after my visit to Italy.

History

Games with elements of historical events in the background are in themselves magnetic. Especially when something interesting is happening on the screen, and we know that a few hundred years ago it really took place. The crowning example is the Assassin’s Creed series. In the last installment titled Unity we can walk around Paris from the period of the French Revolution. The game has even an entire database with descriptions of buildings, people and historical events from that period. Of course, some productions are more faithful to the truth than the other, but the vision of an alternate reality answering the question “what if …” can be just as charming.

Originally published at jackgraal.com on December 7, 2014.