Chess = Video games?

We all know someone who boast their intelligence by mentioning their skills in chess. But what if someone do  the same with video gaming? Such as: "I am a great CoD player therefore I have an incredible hand to brain coordination." Would you agree with that?

  I have always had success with video games all of my life, going back to the Coleco Vision and Intellivision. Always amongst whatever group of friends I had at the time, I was always the one to beat, whether it be Pac-Man or Asteroids all the way up to MK, Street Fighter and Madden. Now they were all good players as well, but every week, when we used to hit the arcades or have home tournaments in whatever game suited our liking at the time, I would be the one to stand victorious. Even others at the arcades would join our group that night and all would be turned away.

   When it came to being online in Warcraft or Starcraft, even the amazing DOOM games, they all swallowed and choked on my boiling steel from my machine guns.

   But that was then. Chess is now. But I still have the occasional slip into Civilization V, but since MP is relatively limited in that game, I spend my time in constant warfare against the CPU. To me. Chess is Civilization on 64 squares 

  -Mark

Video games are designed not to be challenging necessarily, but to keep you hooked.  They are designed to be marketed and sold and make money, not to provide the best game, or the most stimulating, or even interesting.  They are designed to be played for hours on end and not quite exhaust you, just string you along.  They have psychologists work in breaks and rewards, just to keep you pushing that button and playing their video games. Video games are made to make you not think too hard. 

Chess was invented and developed before all that.  It is above it.  It is not marketable to most people because of this.  I have friends that love video games and other board games but hate chess because it's too difficult, it doesn't have the same lab-rat-on-crack effect.

It's the only game that matters.

Yes everybody who good at chess is very smart.  I am only beginner but I know they are smart because they are always telling me that!

Yes, you must be smart to play video games. With chess, you just need good drink-to-mouth coordination

Yes I drink Koolade and it is very good!  And you have to know all the pieces too and which ones they are and be very good at that, because many of them they wear funny hats.

No.

Just no, chess is a logic game COD is an expensive thumb gym

As someone who's been top 100 in Starcraft and Starcraft 2, lived as a professional poker player for several years, and does OK at chess, I can safely say that most video game skills do carry over game-to-game and genre-to-genre.  Solving game theory from one to the next is pretty similar.

I only play Starcraft 2 casually; it's amazing how difficult opponents in MP are!

As for the OP's question, it depends on whether sub-1000 (casual) to 1300-1400 (studying) in two months is fast improvement.

because they suck at school doesn't mean they have no intelligence.

life isn't all about school

Actually, the longer I'm around, the more life seems to resemble junior high.

Lol I can think of one that's free, but lame jokes aside, some videogames do work the mind. CoD is not one of them though. Obviously puzzle games work the brain but I would argue so do games with deep and complex stories like Nier and Final Fantasy 7

Cool topic

I personally don't think chess has anything to do with intelligence.

The biggest indicator of IQ (not intelligence) that I think chess relates to is visual-spatial awareness.  Video games (like COD) also require great visual-spatial awareness.

So yeah, IMO neither chess nor video games are any indicator of intelligence, but skill in either or both are probably indicators of good vis/space awareness.

I think that's right, and squirrels kick everyone's asses in that department

Street Fighter 2 was very competitive

You can't "change" your IQ but within a few points in either direction. It is what it is - Like your eye color. What you can do is educate yourself and exercise your brain so that you can successfully utilize all of what you DO have.

This is such a common misconception. Kids get out of college and think they got "smarter". They became educated. There's a huge difference.