Which games did you find useful in real life?

[jotd]

Video games have the reputation of making you a no-life, a nerd, whatever, and it's generally true when abused.

But do you have some examples of video games that actually helped you in your real life?

Mine:

- 2 player games like Supercars 2, Speedball 2, Rodland, Pang, most of Earok CD32 & beer games help making other people discover how fun can the amiga be. Great moments of conviviality for 25 years, and it still goes on, when once a year I gather my machines (Amiga, Raspberri Pi, PCs with steering wheels & fighting controllers) for my sons birthday party.

- Test Drive II: that one I believe actually helped me getting my driver's license (not Mario Kart as in movie cliched dialogues), by remembering to keep right, and shift gears when the sound of the engine asks for it. Hard Driving could have helped, but the conversion sucks so much compared to the arcade...

- Supercars 2, Gods, Cadaver, Magic Pockets: for giving me the motivation to remake them (partially or completely), and to improve my coding skills

- Short & casual arcade sessions with classics (Galaga, Pacman, etc...). Short by design so not too much time wasted, and stimulating. And once in a while you play a little longer and end up happier because of that

[chip]

Hmm, interesting question

For me games and real life are two separated things

So, the answer is no one, no games helped me in real life

Games were "another" life for me (nowadays i don't play no more)

[jotd]

Chip that's one very valid answer to make. I can fully understand that. Realizing this is something at least.

I'm sure casual arcade gaming is of some value. Short, stimulating, fun.

[chip]

Yep, to be honest, i never played with friends (except for Sensible Soccer on Amiga)

So, the experience was always like "Alone in the dark"

[Predseda]

http://hol.abime.net/3407

[john4p]

Online Poker helped me pay some bills at the end of my studies when I was completely broke.

[Gordon]

Sports games helped me understand the rules of the respective sport.

I learnt how to manage money from Super Cars 2.

I mastered backgammon from playing on the amiga so I could beat people in real life.

I learnt sometimes you need to work as a team to succeed from Lemmings.

I learnt patience from Settlers.

[meynaf]

Learned chess by playing Battle Chess.

Perhaps Civilization/Colonization can help understanding the world in some way.

[Cubemon]

Originally Posted by meynaf

Perhaps Civilization/Colonization can help understanding the world in some way.

Indeed. We managed to surprise our history teacher a few times with some things we picked up playing Civilization.

[StingRay]

Every game with a decent protection as otherwise I wouldn't code for a living nowadays!

[roondar]

Well, most arcade and action games train both your perceptiveness and reaction times. Which can be a genuine boom in real life.

For me personally, those types of games are probably why I tend to spot small mistakes/things on a big screen fairly quickly when my co-workers tend to not spot them (which has on several occasions quite literally saved us many hours of work) and why I tend to spot things happening on the road fairly quickly and then react to them quickly as well.

Other than that, I'd say that my love for strategy and RPG games has helped me develop my problem solving skills and imagination.

Lastly, games in general got me into coding as I always wanted to replicate what I saw in my most loved games and so took up programming (first as a hobby, now as my job). There's quite a bit of good in games, assuming you don't overdo it

[jayminer]

Perhaps some puzzle games helped me improve how to solve things logically, games like Bombuzal, Puzznic, Lolo (NES)... Sometimes they require some thinking outside the box to solve a problem.

Other than that, I'm not sure but I guess there are lot of small things in games I have played I have used in real life, subconsiously.

[gimbal]

Good question. This'll probably be revisited a few times. But for now:

Sierra adventures helped me to learn English beyond the extremely basic level I got in school, and to type faster because of those blasted timed segments

(Of course early morning cartoons did most of the work, but the games definitely helped to build my vocabulary).

[lordofchaos]

I struggled with spelling at school (Dyslexia) and the sierra adventure games helped me improve this. Learnt more about the use of grammar from playing space quest than I did in English class.

Edit: Just noticed you mention the sierra games too Gimbal. Playing games can be educational it seems.

[gimbal]

A few, yes I'm racking my brain but so far I'm not really coming up with other examples. Games definitely got me into programming and defined my career but if that is a GOOD thing... I'm still on the fence

[Dastardly]

Pixel art and computer game graphics inspired me to spend hours on Deluxe Paint and ultimately become a graphic designer.


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[Retro-Nerd]

Some RPGs helped me to understand the English language better. So, not all the time was wasted then. And my eye-hand coordination is still pretty good.

[005AGIMA]

1) Hard Drivin (More the Arcade version tbh): helped with knowing how to drive a car, before I even...drove a car.

2) Collection of flight sims and their associated instruction manuals: Helped me get TOP MARKS for a "Theory of flight" exam back in school, and no doubt helped me understand how to fly a plane, which I have only done twice. Second time I was doing aerobatics. Didn't help ready me for the motion sickness though lol

3) Elite II (Frontier): Understand and think about retro trust, which in turn helped me avoid crashing a car on snow. Was sliding toward a parked car. Brakes were doing NOTHING.....so I shoved that little Proton Persona into reverse and hit the throttle. Worked. Came to a stop.

4) Elite III (First Encounters): Opened my eyes to the correlation between world events and commodity prices. Maybe one day I can use that information to actually make money lol.

5) Elite II and III: Helped me understand more about the nights sky, given it's based off of our galaxy and the star names are accurate. Looking at a star in the real sky, using a star chart to find it's name, and finding yourself muttering "I used to run fruit and veg runs there. Good profit to be made there!" doesn't help you make friends.

6) 3D Pool: Helped with visualising angels in....pool, and in understanding more about top, back, side spin.

7) Various driving sims most notably GT5, with a Logitech G27 in custom made seat, helped practice advance driving techniques in preparation for track days and a two day classic rally event.

there's probably more.....

oh....

8) Call of Duty / Battlefield: helped with strategy in paint ball.

9) Super Mario: Helped with collecting coins and consuming magic mushrooms.....ok I lied about that one.

[PortuguesePilot]

Games helped me:

1) Get better at English, Spanish and French
2) Train my dexterity and manual (fingers?) agility
3) Train my abilities to socialize and to act as a leader within a group (by party gaming)
4) Understand how a manual gearbox works
5) Get better at (and sometimes learn from the grounds up) the rules to many sports and board games
6) Get better at general knowledge (many games had historical or geographic references)
7) etc. (though surely they helped in other things, I can't remember any more right now)

[Hillsy_]

Civilization - Teaches you alot about history and the important aspects of each cultures history.

One of the finest games and most significant game to hit gaming as a platform. Truely a remarkable and inspired game that has stood 'the test of time.'

Civilization, a game far ahead of it's time.