Multiplayer games taught me that I generally dislike other people.
Sorry in advance to people who hate talking about it but Dark Souls is a very paradoxical experience It can:
- Help you learn patience and awareness
- Help you learn not to stress over losses
- Help you learn that people have different experiences of enjoyment and understand your scope of interest in games.
I think that only works if you already have that in the first place though (and you already have enough mechanical skill to get anywhere in those games fast enough to get hooked)
Have made the mistake of introducing people who don't really play videogames to games like Celeste before thinking it'll help them improve but it only ends in frustration
Bethesda games taught me to save at every opportunity
On the other hand, that taught me to use more than just quicksave. Too many instances of saving just before I die, setting me back hours.
I’m surprised not to see more people mention From Software games. Going all the way back to demon’s souls they consistently teach you how to understand the tools at your disposal, the challenge that you currently face, and how to use the former to overcome the latter. I learned how to “read” opponents to find and exploit vulnerabilities while playing dark souls way back, and that general approach is consistently useful in all sorts of other games. There are lots of other translatable skills involved, of course, like timing and resource management.
Yeah I agree,
Other games mentioned in this thread involve a lot more manual introspection to get better at, otherwise you're at risk of just repeating the same mistakes again and again without realising.
In the Souls games you simply cannot progress without learning and becoming better.
There's always that special moment when you dip your toes into NG+ and overcome bosses first try that would have taken you dozens of attempts beforehand
getting incredibly good at Quake back in the day made me good at basically any first person shooter game that you put in front of me
Also, the first time using a mouse for look/steer-ing. Before that (e.g. Doom 1/2 etc.) you just used the arrow keys.
Rocket League. If I can reach my fast moving targets without having to adjust pitch, roll, yaw, and thrust, all at once, from a third-person view, there's just no challenge.
I second Rocket League. It's hard to find other competitive games that scratch the itch now though. I used to be an FPS guy but the challenge they have just makes me wish I was splaying rocket league
Counter Strike: raw aim, how to outsmart opponents, perfect practice makes perfect and if you put enough hours into anything and do it correctly/good, then you can get good at almost anything.
Path of Exile: Taught me about being efficient. If you're repeating the same action 10,000 times, if you can cut even 1 second off each time you do that action, it adds up over time to a significant amount. And then you can try and cut another 2 seconds off...then another second.
It took me 1038 hours to get out of silver in csgo. It took me 10hrs to get to DMG, one day something just clicked.
Celeste was the first "hard" game I played that I actually ended up 100%ing. It's so fun and makes me try harder on other games too
This is admittedly kind of an oddball interpretation of "better gamer", but my personal take on that is being able to enjoy games more, as opposed to any measure of skill in playing them (and also understanding that there's a lot of overlap there, but humor me for a sec :P).
Perspective: currently in my mid 30s, peak gaming for my childhood was competitive shit like the N64's Smash Bros (which is the best Smash Bros. Fite meh.) or 007; fast forward to some racing type games, COD... the thing those all have in common was that the fun was in defeating your opponent, and any aspect of the game that wasn't competitive just kinda automatically felt not fun. Nor was getting stuck in a losing streak from playing against people better than me; or winning streak from playing against people who weren't challenging to beat. The window of potential to actually have 'fun' was shockingly narrow.
The game that kinda pulled me out of that was Halo CE. Right out the gate, it looked like any other shooter, and it had a rapidly growing community and the competitive elements that caught my initial attention. Fire it up, and it IMMEDIATELY stood out as something special. Up to that point, videogame music was pretty much exclusively simple digital sounding jingles, so the Halo CE login screen music hit like a fucking truck. I start up the campaign, and experience another first: the story had me hooked. Campaigns in shooters only ever felt like a tutorial you have to sit through to not be terrible in multiplayer, but Halo CE was like a full-blown movie, with each scene supported by a literal symphony.
It made me look at games differently - things like Zelda had flown under my radar, cuz what's the point if there's no multiplayer?? Not even score to compare?? Got myself a copy of OOC, and "...oh, that's why."
So, long story short, Halo CE was my gateway drug into RPGs.
More in tune with OP's question though, it kinda yanked off the blinders that stopped me from fully enjoying parts of some games, or entire genres of games.
...and that whole spiel is ofc relative to my subjective experience to the gaming industry circa ...idk, 1995+? So, Halo CE probably won't hit the same against today's gaming industry: but keep an eye out for games that blend elements you know you enjoy with material you haven't really dabbled into - you could unlock an entire new genre of awesome experiences.
Crusader Kings reminded me that losing can be fun
Nothing like castrating half of the family tree because of that one time your brother tried to break up your empire!
Sekiro
Many games come down to finding some unbreakable combo of buttons or abilities and when you have that figured out you steamroll the game. To successfully finish Sekiro, you must be patient. Learn when to let your enemy attack, so that they leave themselves open or provide you with a chance to parry.
There's no leveling up to get so strong you can thrash any boss, like in other souls games. You just have to learn the game mechanics and get good.
Quake 3 Arena and Unreal Tournament. In my opinion, these are still two of the greatest games of all time. You don’t get better because your character or weapon is better. You get better because you put in the practice. you improve your reflexes. You learn the arena. Every player starts every match on an even playing field. Every frag feels like an accomplishment.
I appreciate that modern shooters are trying to do something different with every iteration. But stuff like call of duty, overwatch, or destiny never captures that magic. In many ways, they felt more like slot machines.
Halo got close, but I always felt it was too slow. And also, I felt Tribes was the better series for online play that felt similar. 
Dark Souls, don't give up skeleton, rethink your strategy and learn what's being thrown at you, you'll get through it.
Eve Online taught me that math + leadership are effective ways to win. Also the importance of thinking strategically and weighing risks.
World of Warcraft taught me that many people are willing to craft items all day, if it earns more in-game gold than actually doing anything fun in the game (actually in hindsight this was true of Eve, and real life for that matter). I sort of... ran an exploitative in-game sweatshop producing things for the in-game markets (e.g. not involving real money or anything that violated the rules of the game).
These two groups of realizations made me pretty good at online games for a little while! My gaming hobby came to an abrupt end when I realized I could just... start a company IRL and be paid non-virtual money.
So, you learned how to open a sweat shop? XD
Yes, I suppose so! Technically with child labor too!
We just call them factories here though, not sweat shops. They have varying levels of working conditions, and child labor has been more or less eliminated.
Some are awful, and others are quite OK! I've personally had worse jobs than the OK ones. Some have integrated housing too, I knew someone that designed it. The ones they designed looked quite reasonable, at least -- I've unambiguously lived worse places. You won't save much money working for an OK sweatshop, but you will accumulate a small pension, eat, have a place to live, and get 2 weeks vacation a year (usually accompanied with a bonus equal to a month's pay). Most people I know see them as a sort of always-available job that's the closest thing we have to a social net right now.
I run a small tech company though, not a sweat shop. Just recently, an opportunity to help open one did come up though!
A client is looking at setting up backoffice work in the countryside, so far it looks like we'll be able to offer decent working conditions and wages. I'm slowly building the management software -- fewer managers means we can pay workers better as well as be more profitable. If it works out, it would probably pay about double the regional minimum wage, which amounts to a decent job, certainly better than a lot of people have currently.
It's not perfect, but it's progress. There's still a hundred ways it can go wrong and fail. So far we only have 10 staff, but it's going steady.
For about 3 years though, I earned less running my company than the workers in the worst sweatshops. Even with all my video game experience! That was hard. Still, video games were my first experiences with management, accounting, economics and so on. It was better than nothing.
Anyway that's a slice of life for you, fresh from Southeast Asia.
Not that it’s much of a benefit today as RTS games are barely nonexistent. But StarCraft 2 taught me all about macro management. Spending them resources and building an economy.
Hollow Knight 100%. Its also my favorite game.
Portal was my first FPS on a computer. Got me to practice using mouse and keyboard and now I can't imagine playing an FPS with a controller
When I was a kid it took me 2-3 weeks to beat the Flight School mission series in GTA: San Andreas, and although I hated nearly every minute of it I did become a better video game flier.
Gta vice city as I learned how to type properly as I couldn't figure out how to pause the game to type aspirin with 1 finger. Does that count?
World of Warcraft. 12 years of playing and raid/guild leadership helped me learn how to play, not just play. How to:
- Theorycraft
- Research how to improve
- Maximize output and/or efficiency
- Take advantage of class synergies in games
- Understand the importance of area of effect, burst damage, sustained single-target damage, etc.
- Understand damage mitigation vs avoidance, and where each is valuable
- Play to my/my team's strengths, rather than simply doing what is "best"
- Better recognize trends in game mechanics to anticipate what may come
- Recognize the valuable portions of a game's user interface and maximize its visibility while avoiding clutter
I had learned portions of these things in other games, but my leadership role in WoW pushed me to truly understand many things that aren't a major focus in most games.
WoW increased my typing speed and accuracy as without voip, its essential to communicate effectively.
Six-ish years ago I would say Overwatch. It was my first online multiplayer FPS and it fosters a lot of skills. Teamwork, communication, mechanical ability, game sense, ability management, managing tilt, etc.
Too bad Blizzard decided to stop new content for Overwatch 1 for years, only to reintroduce Overwatch 1.5 with an upgraded battlepass and cash shop monetization scheme. I don't get how people are still playing after what they did to it.
This dates me somewhat, but trials maps in UT2004 helped me develop a lot of precision and fast fingers.
It was a multiplayer FPS, but it had cool mobility like double-tap dodges, double jumps, wallkicks, and crouch jumps. And they could be combined in many ways, so there were platforming levels of varying levels of difficulty. Diagonal dodge-doublejump with a wallkick at the very end to get onto a platform that's like 4 inches square, type of thing.
I have two answers.
First, my general reflexes, situational awareness in games etc. were strongly improved thanks to Doom Eternal. The game keeps you stressed and engaged the whole time (especially on the harder difficulties) and you have to be very quick. It was the first time I needed custom keybindings to be fast enough to solve some sections. Switching between 8 weapons, sometimes after single shots, is something you have to get used to, but it's incredibly fun!
Second, specifically for 6DoF navigation, Outer Wilds was incredible. When I started I could barely make the spaceship go anywhere without exploding, now I feel I could be pretty good at a 6DoF racing game!
Elden Ring.
I didn’t love the learning/difficulty curve of Soulsborne games until this one, but it got its hooks in me hard.
I usually spammed most boss fights and played everything a certain way, but here I had to learn the boss’s moves and dodge, parry and use power ups to bring them down.
Worth it. While frustrating, it made me return to other genres and play them again but differently. Hitman, sniper elite, roguelites/likes, anything that rewards patience, really. These now had a whole new facet I didn’t see before, or I did and I was applying it to these games.
I’ve since tried other soulsborne games, and while I now appreciate the difficulty and find them a lot more fun, the exploration and world of Elden Ring was the difference maker for me. It was being able to forge my own path and choose my challenges.
The 3 that stand out the most for me thinking back on it
Typer Shark and Mud's (typing skills)
Really helped me get down my typing skills which translates to a lot of pc based games (even just chat). Mud's were some of my favorite fast paced games (multi-user dungeons). Godwar's was my shtick and as a Drow character you had a lot of powers you had to get out before an opponent could notice and respond to your presence.
MechWarrior: Sega Genesis (team work skills)
This was a crazy one I would play with family. There was a co-op mode that allowed one person to control the bottom half while the other person controlled the top half of your mech. You really had to cooperate and work together so it didn't turn into an actual physical brawl because of the frustrations.
Call of Duty: Zombies (game mechanics)
This was probably my first game that I really got into game/enemy mechanics. To survive to higher rounds you had to adapt and know what the zombies were gonna do. Later iterations kinda destroyed that feature with zombies stumbling and etc but I get they were trying to stay innovative and fresh, still killed the genre for me though.
Honorable mentions are the great RTS's that were everywhere in the 90's. Starcraft for sure but even blizzards previous Warcraft's and then of course C&C and even Dune (another sega game but solid RTS for it's time). Really though the skills for RTS's don't translate as direct to other games anymore (just got me better at the RTS's that I love) as more and more they become hero focused like what they did with WC3.
edit: grammar
StarCraft 2
Mostly for building in-game awareness. Helped in a lot of games, even FPSs. Just always being proactive when facing some kind of meta.
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (PS2).
You either learned, or you quitted.
Rhythm Games in general, but specifically osu!mania taught me that I can, like, actually get good at completely new stuff no matter how much I suck at it to begin with
It also taught me that I really like Hardcore EDM, before hand I wouldn't really listen to music cuz I wasn't sure exactly what kind of music I was drawn to
Red Dead Redemption 2 taught me once again to slow down and take all the time I want with these huge games. I've saved a ton of money since.
In relation to skill, playing a ton of the original Halo on Xbox at my friend's house while being only a PlayStation owner got me really good at using arbitrary controls.
Ori and the Blind Forest. I sucked when i first played it :D
GTFO. It has honed a ton of skills for me. Coordination/cooperation, accuracy, ammo conversation, fast problem solving, the ability to switch from fast to slow and back very quickly, the list goes on. It's the most intense game of red light green light I've played.
Megaman X - Probably the best Action Platformer ever, it teaches you all the basics of the genre through gameplay alone.
Metal Slug 2 - Cuphead too hard for you? Then give this good ol' classic a shot! It has simple yet fun mechanics and you can go as trigger happy as you want. And don't feel bad if you play on Free Play Mode, what matters is that you have fun!
Gran Turismo (PSP) - If you want to get into the series (or into Racing Simulators in general) this is probably your best bet, you have all stages available from the beginning and very little customization, but you can feel the progressiveness of the game as you buy more powerful cars and unlock higher difficulties.
Grand Theft Auto III - This game can be really hard at times (no swimming, only 3 safehouses, cars are really fragile, etc.) But once you understand the mechanics of the game and you start getting better, the rest of the series is a piece of cake. (Also, i loved the freedom you had when performing most missions in this game, it makes sense that later titles restricted you due to being more "story oriented", but GTA V's missions really just feel like going through film setpieces that is boring :/)
Metroid Dread. The quick thinking and reacting to avoid the E.M.M.I.s has helped me. But also raises my adrenaline whenever I hear that music…
If you think Super Meat Boy is hard oh boy do I have one for you.
The End Is Nigh is also an Edmund McMullen platformer, but with a much higher emphasis on precision. The game is technically short, but there are just so many easy ways to die that you have to get good to beat it.
It also has a little modding community that has produced some even more nightmarish levels to go along with it.
Life
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