Learning! With Video Games!!

[Durxom]

With all of this video game court trail, and "Grr, Vidya Games R Bad!" stuff going around, I thought it would be nice to have a positive video game thread floating about =]

So, most of us usually end up playing games just for entertainment, to have fun, or just for something to do. But sometimes, without knowing it, these games might just teach you something, or cause something thought provoking within your noggin. So, the main questions of this topic here are, have video games ever taught you anything? or have they caused you to go look something up? (ie. you liked this gun that you were using during all of your tough firefights in some modern FPS, so you went and looked it up)

*please try and keep this serious if you can, the less "Durr, I learned how to frag noobs!!1!", the better

Some of the more major things I learned about with games are:

Mythology with Age of Mythology
Chinese and Japanese History with Dynasty Warriors, Samurai Warriors, and Sengoku Basara
Farming and Livestock with Harvest Moon
Medieval Weapons with Oblivion, Fire Emblem, and others

 

[thenamelessloser]

Xenogears got me into philosophy and psychology (This is not to say how accurate the game was to its subjects). I'm not an expert in either subject but I would maybe not read some of the books I read if it wasn't for playing a game like that getting me interested in those topics.

Fallout New Vegas from reading topics about it, I learned how Caesar supposed to be pronounced.

 

[RaphaelsRedemption]

I researched weapons from my experience in playing FPS games.

RTS games, especially Supreme Commander, taught me a lot about wise finiancial management, as you have to work hard to balance your resource production and your war production.

Lots of games showed me the effect of time wasting and time management!

And finally, games made me so interested in the area of games itself that I did a 6 month certificate of Multimedia, where I learnt lots about the nuts and bolts of creating and crafing games

 

[Private Custard]

I knew I could probably have a good crack at it before, but I now seriously think I could land a large passenger aircraft if both pilots were somehow incapacitated.

Bear with it. Just like a real flight, I had to taxi to the runway before the awesomness!

 

[SomeLameStuff]

Well Mass Effect helped me remember Newton's Laws

 

[x0ny]

Actually there was a newspaper article about this sort of thing a few months ago. They did a study on people who played FPSs and people who didn't. If I remember correctly, the result was that the people who played FPSs had better reaction times than people who played any other game, with people who played RPGs having the slowest reaction time.

FPS players not only answered questions quickly, but got the most correct as well. Bottom line, play more FPSs!

 

[Cogwheel]

Actually there was a newspaper article about this sort of thing a few months ago. They did a study on people who played FPSs and people who didn't. If I remember correctly, the result was that the people who played FPSs had better reaction times than people who played any other game, with people who played RPGs having the slowest reaction time.

FPS players not only answered questions quickly, but got the most correct as well. Bottom line, play more FPSs!

I have to wonder how that would apply to bullet hell games. What do you think?

Edit: And I would've thought RPGs would still be somewhat faster than anyone playing, say, Civilization.

 

[blankedboy]

TF2... that game has made me unbelievable observant. I'll notice the most amazing details now.

 

[x0ny]

I have to wonder how that would apply to bullet hell games. What do you think?

Edit: And I would've thought RPGs would still be somewhat faster than anyone playing, say, Civilization.

I'm not sure, I don't play alot of bullet hell games, I can only think of 1942 at the moment, maybe R-type but the enemies don't really shoot at you, more like fly straight at you kamikaze style. If I saw a hail of bullets flying at me, like you normally get in 1942 I just say "Fuck it" and die without trying to dodge.

So I can't really say, but my guess would be, yes at first when the player is new to the game, high reaction times are required, but over time no, because the player would have memorized the enemies' attack patterns.

With regards to games such as Civilization, I think we have to bear in mind that this wasn't some extensive study, but just a headline grabber, it certainly got my attention.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/shootemups-are-good-for-you-say-researchers-2078435.html

 

[Cogwheel]

Things

I'm aware that it's not an extensive study. Just some crazy rambling for me that's not particularly related to anything, don't mind me.

As for bullet hell... well, R-type and so on, for me, are scrolling shoot-em-ups. Bullet hell is a subdivision of that genre, sorta. For a good example, look here.

 

[x0ny]

Things

As for bullet hell... well, R-type and so on, for me, are scrolling shoot-em-ups. Bullet hell is a subdivision of that genre, sorta. For a good example, look here.

Ah yeah, so I was a little closer with 1942, which I only just learnt had a sequel... called 1943. I played 1942 at an arcade in Hong Kong, damn thing swallowed alot of my coins.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1942_%28video_game%29

 

[De Ronneman]

How smearing nitroglycerin on your bullets makes them explode in Alone in the Dark(2008)

too bad that's not how it works...

 

[Vivace-Vivian]

Medal of Honor taught me what Nazis were before all the other kiddies knew.

Other then that a lot of my vocabulary comes from games like Final Fantasy. Tomb Raider inspired me to study ancient civilization.

I think any media teaches you something, whether it's Homer Simpson likes doughnuts or Fire is weak to Water.