Age and race relative to video game ability

[Ohrami]

This thread was moved by a moderator from a different thread, so sorry if some of the quoting and phrasing doesn't make much sense because of it.

(unless you're getting very old, but that's not the problem for anyone right now).

A little (okay, more like very) off topic, but I've been finding the ages of Donkey Kong players very interesting. In competitive StarCraft, anyone who is in their late 20s is considered old. That's also around the age where most of the best, godlike players' skills start to deteriorate. Another interesting thing about StarCraft: Almost every single one of the "top 20" players of StarCraft have been South Korean for the past 13+ years it's been played competitively, except for very few exceptions. Never has the best player in the world been from a country other than South Korea. However, in first-person shooter games like Counter-Strike and Quake, almost no Asian teams or players ever make it to the top 5, ever. It's always Europeans and Americans. In my favorite game, osu!, almost all of the best players are either South Korean or Japanese (save for two ridiculously good Polish players); us Americans, despite having a good number of very active players, don't have nearly as strong of a country as, for example, Japan, which has at least 10 players better than America's best. And, interestingly, the top 3 players in the world (Cookiezi, South Korea; Niko, Poland; and rrtyui, Japan) are aged 17, 15, and 14, much younger than the top players of Donkey Kong.

I've heard Hank Chien make the argument that race doesn't factor into video game skills, but in almost every game I have played, I've noticed otherwise. I don't mean to be racist (I don't think "He's Asian so it's not fair!" is even close to a fair excuse), but I'm interested in seeing what other people think about the issue of age and race.

[marky_d]

What is "a good number" of players, exactly? Have you seen a breakdown of estimated players per country anywhere? Those numbers would be interesting to compare.

[Ohrami]

https://osu.ppy.sh/p/countryranking
https://osu.ppy.sh/p/pp ("rankings" of players)

Click on a country to see the best-ranked players of each country, although the rankings aren't perfectly accurate; they're using a very complicated algorithm that judges people based on how "skillful" their best scores are, but what it judges as "skillful" isn't always necessarily the most skillful. Generally, the top 10 players are considered to be:

1. Cookiezi (South Korea)
2. Niko (Poland)
3. rrtyui (Japan)
4. White Wolf (Poland)
5. Remilia-Scarlet (South Korea)
6. Rucker (Taiwan)
And after this, the list becomes a little subjective, but I would say...
7. SiLviA (Japan)
8. KeigoClear (Japan)
9. serea (Japan)
10. Torein 13rd (China)

[Xermon54]

I don't think "races" make a huge difference, overall. Like Hank once said to me, asians are usually better in fast action/thinking game (like Starcraft).

Personally, I think that everyone in the world are "relatively" the same. It all depends about culture and stuff.

Like in Canada, we're known as being the best in curling in the world. It's DEFINITELY not because we have more "natural talent" than others. It's just because curling is more popular in Canada, therefore people play it more/more competition (although I don't give a sh*t about curling, it's a retarded sport).

Who are the best marathoners? It's usually African people. Why? Not necessarily because they have more natural talent for running long-distance, but mainly because running marathon is more of a tradition than any other places, so there are a lot of people running there.

As for Starcraft, you have to admit that it's more than a tradition for Koreans! And since Starcraft is pretty much part of their culture, they devote a lot of time for this game, and want to do good (just like Canadians with Curling/hockey).

I think that the "culture" has a bigger influence than "natural talent" personally.

[stella_blue]

Excuse me for a moment, while I put away my curling "broom" (just kidding, Vincent).

I agree with Monsieur Lemay on this one.  I believe the explanation is largely cultural; many games are simply more popular in some countries than in others.

Hold on a second . . . What does any of this have to do with Kong Off 3 qualifications?   

[mikegmi2]

Well, your post opens up several different subjects for debate...but trying to stick mainly to Donkey Kong...I think several things factor in.

Donkey Kong was marketed toward the US. Therefore, I think it has always been most popular in the US, and so most of the top players are from the USA, or Canada. North America, respectively. Starcraft, on the other hand, I believe was released in Asian markets first (this might not be true)...and around half of all copies of Starcraft were sold in South Korea over the 10 year span after it was first released.  That's a much higher concentration of South Korean Starcraft players compared to the rest of the world.  It seems only natural that the best players for a particular game would be from a country where the highest concentration of players of that particular game, live.  Things might be completely different if Japan marketed the game for Australians and most of the DK machines were in Australia, and DK was replaced with an evil Kangaroo...or something like that.

I would tend to agree with Hank...race really doesn't matter...it's more of a "what appeals to gamers in this region" kinda thing.  If I HAD to guess who the best games are, I would have to go with people from Asian countries.  They seem to dominate most of the most popular E-Sports.  League of Legends is the most popular e-sports game right now, and the best teams are currently from Japan and Taiwan...but it should be pointed out that European teams layed the foundation for how the current metagame is played (1 bruiser top lane, 1 AP mid lane, 1 jungler, 2 bot lane (1 support, 1 ADC).

It would be interesting to see what scores some of the South Korean Starcraft players could put up on Donkey Kong.  In all honestly, Starcraft imho is a much more difficult game than Donkey Kong.  It requires so much more quick decision making skills and fast reaction time...it's just insane watching one of the top players play...the keyboard commands they make per minute, impressive stuff.  I don't think they would be able to sit through an entire game of DK though...it would probably be like watching paint dry for them.

[Xermon54]

I think it's impossible to say that a game like Starcraft is harder than a game like Donkey Kong. Since there will always be a way to improve at both games, it's impossible to determine one game that is harder than the other.

But obviously, the actual best Starcraft player, right now, is without a doubt a LOT better than a 1.2m score in Donkey Kong. But what about a 1.3m score? A 1.3m score in Donkey Kong requires a ridiculous amount of luck, and a ridiculous amount of skills... just like being the best in Starcraft!

So as long as you will be able to "indefinitely" become better at a game, it's hard to say that one game is harder than the other one (with the exceptions of game like Pac-Man, where there's a "definite limite" for improvments)

[Ohrami]

Well, your post opens up several different subjects for debate...but trying to stick mainly to Donkey Kong...I think several things factor in.

Donkey Kong was marketed toward the US. Therefore, I think it has always been most popular in the US, and so most of the top players are from the USA, or Canada. North America, respectively. Starcraft, on the other hand, I believe was released in Asian markets first (this might not be true)...and around half of all copies of Starcraft were sold in South Korea over the 10 year span after it was first released.  That's a much higher concentration of South Korean Starcraft players compared to the rest of the world.  It seems only natural that the best players for a particular game would be from a country where the highest concentration of players of that particular game, live.  Things might be completely different if Japan marketed the game for Australians and most of the DK machines were in Australia, and DK was replaced with an evil Kangaroo...or something like that.

I would tend to agree with Hank...race really doesn't matter...it's more of a "what appeals to gamers in this region" kinda thing.  If I HAD to guess who the best games are, I would have to go with people from Asian countries.  They seem to dominate most of the most popular E-Sports.  League of Legends is the most popular e-sports game right now, and the best teams are currently from Japan and Taiwan...but it should be pointed out that European teams layed the foundation for how the current metagame is played (1 bruiser top lane, 1 AP mid lane, 1 jungler, 2 bot lane (1 support, 1 ADC).

It would be interesting to see what scores some of the South Korean Starcraft players could put up on Donkey Kong.  In all honestly, Starcraft imho is a much more difficult game than Donkey Kong.  It requires so much more quick decision making skills and fast reaction time...it's just insane watching one of the top players play...the keyboard commands they make per minute, impressive stuff.  I don't think they would be able to sit through an entire game of DK though...it would probably be like watching paint dry for them.

Regarding the cultural points Vincent made: it's understandable that more players in a country will mean more top-level players from that country, but you have to consider that there have never been "amazing" non-Korean StarCraft players. This includes the ones who dedicate 10+ hours a day to the game, move to South Korea, and live off of the game professionally. In my other example, osu!, the best player in the world is South Korean, and many of the best players in the world are South Korean, despite them having 1/4 the overall number of "plays" when compared to Japanese people.

From what I understand, StarCraft was never intended for Korean release, with its original release being in North America. I think that it was eventually localized for Koreans, but I'm not entirely sure. As for StarCraft players being bored by Donkey Kong's slow pace: I play osu!, and that that game is much faster-paced and requires many more actions per second than StarCraft (though doesn't require nearly as much multi-tasking), yet I enjoy Donkey Kong a lot.

Example of me playing osu!: Renard - Dash Hopes 3 - 95.4% S
You can see what buttons I'm pressing on the right side of the screen. (Keyboard 1, Keyboard 2, Mouse 1, and Mouse 2.)

I think it's impossible to say that a game like Starcraft is harder than a game like Donkey Kong. Since there will always be a way to improve at both games, it's impossible to determine one game that is harder than the other.

But obviously, the actual best Starcraft player, right now, is without a doubt a LOT better than a 1.2m score in Donkey Kong. But what about a 1.3m score? A 1.3m score in Donkey Kong requires a ridiculous amount of luck, and a ridiculous amount of skills... just like being the best in Starcraft!

So as long as you will be able to "indefinitely" become better at a game, it's hard to say that one game is harder than the other one (with the exceptions of game like Pac-Man, where there's a "definite limite" for improvments)

The thing about that, though, is that I think the peak of performance possible by a human in Donkey Kong is far less than in StarCraft. In StarCraft, a person who can think, react, and move ridiculously fast and accurately will never lose a game if he applies a decent strategy. However, in Donkey Kong, you don't really need fast reactions or speed. I think because of the slower and more randomized nature of the game, Donkey Kong's skill ceiling is much lower than a game like StarCraft. That's not to say both games aren't very hard, but I think that the maximum limit of a human would be reached in Donkey Kong far sooner than in StarCraft.

[Xermon54]

In term of skills, you are probably right. It would take an unlimited amount of time to reach the best skills in Starcraft, "unlike" Donkey Kong. However, we also need to apply the "luck" factor, which I think is a big part of every game.

In term of skills, I agree with what you said Kyou-kun. But after, we need to know if the "luck" factor is part of being good at a game.

It's like the best Starcraft player in the world: We can't ultimately say that he's the best Starcraft player in the world, since luck/randomness always play a role in tournaments (like in every sports). Even if one guy is SO MUCH faster than everyone else, it doesn't mean he will win in a tournament.

In term of what can be accomplish, both Donkey Kong and Starcraft are the same, since there are no limit of the maximum. But in term of skills, ultimately, Starcraft has an "unlimited" progression of skills someone can have. Kindda like Donkey Kong, but DK has too much "luck factor" to take into consideration, maybe.

The best example would be Tetris: Someone can clear 40 lines in 20 seconds, but what would be the skill maximum of this game? If we say 15 seconds, then is 14,99 seconds not possible? Could we compare 14,99 seconds to clear 40 lines in Tetris to  the best Starcraft player? And Tetris also has a huge amount of randomness.

It's sometime very hard to compare two "different" things. It's like comparing oranges and apples: you can agree that they are both fruits, but which one tastes the best?

[ChrisP]

While I am not personally offended (that is a very, very hard thing to do) I would strongly urge you to change the discussion here to "nationality" as opposed to "race" (especially because I think  nationality might be what you mean anyway).

If you want to talk about differences in video game ability based on race, just know that you are implying fundamental genetic differences between races, which would most definitely constitute racism, since that is precisely the dictionary definition of the word.

Up to you, but some people are not going to respond to that well!

In any case, among the "non US" world, I have observed that classic gaming seems to have little if any presence in Asian countries, even though there's a fair amount of action in Europe. That's my impression anyway and I'm curious if I'm wrong. Maybe we just don't hear about it. In fact, I read some time back that there's actually a totally unknown Donkey Kong player from Japan who scored a million points many years ago and discussed how he did it online, the problem being that this discussion took place entirely in Japanese!

[Ohrami]

I think that "race" is a better definition of the word I'm meaning to imply. I don't think it's racist to claim that races have fundamental genetic differences, since that is obviously true and I don't think many people would disagree (case in point: appearance). I don't subscribe to the belief that certain races are superior to others as a whole, but I do believe that there are trends regarding which races tend to be better at what. Whether or not this is a genetic distinction I do not know, but I do think that there is some distinction.

Also, send me that Japanese discussion if you still can find it. I can probably tell you what they were saying.

As for what Vincent said... I pretty much agree with all of it, except the point that every sport has random factors; I think there are a large number of games which are only based around skill. I think it's hard to compare Donkey Kong to a game so different, so I think it's pretty much pointless to have a discussion about which one is harder.

[Xermon54]

Yeah, we obviously didn't want to sound racist (I just didn't find any other word than saying "race"). But yeah, by reading this, it might be offending to some people!

But yeah, Kyou-kun, there are differences between nationality (that could obviously affect how someone plays a game!). But I don't know enough about genetic differences to know EXACTLY what to take into consideration when comparing two nationalities. The culture, the popularity of a sport/game is a huge influence, but yeah, nationality (raw skills) would also probably apply, just like it appears to be in sports (some nationality performs better, it might not only be because of culture/popularity of the sport, but probably also their genes, or something like that, haha).

But if that's right, then Canadians have "Curling genes"? I don't want to live in this country anymore! haha.

[homerwannabee]

Hold on now about the superiority of Star Craft players.  I think time should be considered in this whole thing.   The average Star Craft game is about 15 minutes, and the average Donkey Kong played at the top tier skill level is going to be a 3 hour game.

This would be like saying that since Usain Bolt is such a great runner at the 100, and 200 that if he had chosen to go after the 1,500, and 5,000 meter race earlier in his career he would have dominated those even more than the 100, and 200 because of two different reasons

1st) More people compete in the 100, and 200 than the 1500 or 5,000
2nd) The 1500, and 5,000 are at a slower pace than the 100 or 200

In reality a person who is built to be great at a 100 or 200 meter race is not going to be great at a 1500 or 5000 meter race despite the fact that they do the exact same thing.

Donkey Kong is not like Star Craft at all.  Donkey Kong is more of a precision type of game with an overall comprehensive knowledge to perform these certain precision type of skills throughout the game.

Star Craft on the other hand is more built for a person who would do well in a speed chess match with extremely fast finger dexterity.

A great Donkey Kong player has no more of a shot at being great at Star Craft, than anyone else, and a great Star Craft player has no more of a shot at being great at Donkey Kong, than anyone else.