Games can make you smarter!
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/22/magazine/can-you-make-yourself-smarter.html?_r=1&smid=fb-share
Learning About People in Games
I was playing World of Tanks with my friends. It’s a semi-historic tank MMPSRPG – Massive Multi Player Shooter with Role Playing elements! Whew! Now that we got that out of the way… Playing the game I realized that you can learn a lot about a person from how they play.
My friend is a emotional adrenaline junkie and usually thinks very short term a very immediate type personality. He loves driving light fast speedy tanks which zoom around and is a quick high. Which is interesting, because IRL he has a lot of troubles with his finances because he always buys and sells usually at the wrong time because of a lack of planning and foresight. Great guy to have around through is alway in the now, he does not hold grudges and is always fun to have around, but boy when it comes to finances and planning….!
People are usually quite consistent. People do throw away their personalities and pick up new ones when playing a game, unless your bipolar of course (I had to throw in the disclaimer…). Most people have a identity and a set of values which they carry with them everywhere.
Donald trump said if you want to learn about someone play a round of golf with them. If they cheat on the counting par chances are they will cheat on their accounting.
So next time you are playing a multi-player game stop and think what can I learn about this person that I am playing with.
Timeline
I had a games night the other night and I saw Timeline game on the ipad. The game revolves around placing cards which represent events, inventions and discoveries in the right order of dates. It is simple to pick up. It’s a no brainer, the art and interface is beautiful, it’s educational and actually challenging to figure out and remember the actual dates.
The game gives you an option of 4 cards to choose from. Some of the cards have little bonus info tabs which you can read. You pick a card and place the card in where you think the actually date of the event occurred. It has an auto pop up which tell you the actual date if you make a mistake so you can get it right next time.
We played a four player game and went by pretty quick. It creates conversation around historical topics that could be dull and boring but instead makes it fun and engaging to learn. There was more than one occasion that we stopped to go back and see what the actual dates where and read a little about the info. Fun and easy to play a game well worth it to buy.
Gratuitous Space Battles is all about Big Business!
For those who haven’t tried it or know about it. I have been playing Gratuitous Space Battles (GSR) and I have to say it is an AWESOME GAME! Playing it I realized it is very much like owning your own company. These are the top 4 things why playing GSB is like owning a company.
1. Your job is Supreme Commander, not ship captain! When your an owner of a business, you are not an employee. You can give out general attack orders at the beginning of a battle in GSB, but not micromanage every minute detail. When you are running your own company that has more than yourself and your dog, then you have to learn to let people do their job. You’ve hired them for a reason, and they need the room to do they they have been trained to do. You are the overseer of the direction of the company and set directives, but you should not be doing everything yourself or you might as well be a one-person show and do it all yourself. GSB is about being a commander of a space fleet, don’t waste time trying to control every little detail instead learn to build your business and strategically manage your fleet better.
2. Know your opponent and know yourself. Knowing what your going up against is half the battle. When you can see how the enemy fleet is set up, you can build and customize your fleet to defeat them. But preparing for the unknown is also a valid strategy and implementing fail safes into your plan is also a plan.
3. The less you spend the more profit you make. The less points you need to spend building your fleet the more money(honor) your make which you can use to unlock more capital and goodies. You want to take out as many ships as you can while committing as little as ships a possible. Being efficient is how you make profit, and profit is how you get the goodies! Which leads to number 4…
4. Building your business is like building a fleet and battle plan. Each time you enter a battle your trying to find a way to build a better ship and play a better strategy to make it more efficient and earn those few extra honor points. In the business world you are always fine tuning your product to making serve customers better. Build a better product and make a better plan to get your product out there so it can perform at it’s maximum capacity.
5. Every business needs a power system. Power plants are like a system of accounting, each business needs one if it’s going to be any good. You don’t have to have one, but you are not going to get very far if you don’t! Each business have their own parts/modules what you want to equip your business is up to you but you need certain modules to make your ship run smoothly. Certain types of businesses need certain type of equipment. The more lasers you have the more power sources you need. Some equipment require more energy, some more crew, having a ship full of everything does not necessarily make it better. There is a cost for everything. Each module you have affects the overall performance of your ship.
Check it out if your a fan of sci-fi and space battles!
http://positech.co.uk/gratuitousspacebattles/
Spies play games as training
The US Intelligence agency is now using games to teach their operatives.
Move over James Bond N64!
Important life lessons from games?
A interesting little thread about what have you learned from games.
Check it out!
http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/722003/what-have-you-learned-from-games
and more on the humorous side of learning from games…
http://www.gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2011/07/29/important-life-lessons-learned-from-video-gmes.aspx
Site Maintenance
Some technical issues with the site was fixed. The forums were removed over the weekend. Cheers!
Life is a Test
The only real way to know something is to test it out. Do something and then observe the results then adjust to see if there are changes in the results. Comparing two experiments with a control lets you begin to discern truth. Make an experiment out of life and have a control plus begin changing variables to see what works, step and repeat for each goal you have.
If you don’t test things out you are just living in your own mind – there is no relevance to the world around us. You need to tinker with actions and see how things respond to the tinkering.
To interact with the environment and see the response to the experiment, it is the balance between thought and action. My friend once told me thinking and doing is like two oars on a boat. One oar is thinking and one is doing. If you just think you are only using one oar and will spin in circles. If you just do you are just using the other oar and again you will spin in circles. Only when you think and do, do you use both oars to the ship and keep going straight and in the direction you want to travel.
To know the truth means you can make better choices in the future. By knowing the truth you orientate yourself to be able to go where you want. Only when you put things to the test do you see what the truth is.
The most powerful statement is “IF.” Saying if A happens then B is true starts you on a journey to finding truth and real results.