Playing Games

How we spend our free time and our interests tend to define who we are with others.  The titles people give us based on what we do can range from insulting to a playful joke.  I'm usually seen as a gamer and a nerd.

The games I play don't tend to be the usual board games you might see, such as Monopoly or Clue.  I play games that are usually referred to as "specialist games".  These games usually have background and story that one can indulge in, also known as "fluf", that isn't really needed to know to play the game, but can make the game a little more fun.  I primarily play Magic the Gathering and Warhammer 40,000.

I started playing Magic when I was in middle school.  A friend of mine would bring a few decks of his and we would play at lunch.  Playing at lunch became a bit of a tradition that carried out through most of high school.  While the game is fun in itself, it has some things that can help build cognitive skills.  Math is a big part of the game, as both players start with a live total of twenty, and when it reaches zero they lose.  They have to use addition, subtraction, multiplication and division primarily, but there are also a little bit of using variables as well.  Another thing that it helps develop is critical thinking.  With so many combinations in the game that can be done with different cards in order to win, one has to plan out what they're going to do in their turn as well as a few turns ahead.

I started playing Warhammer 40,000 in high school. This is a table top war game where one builds and paints models to represent characters in an army.  It also helps build cognitive skills.  Similar to Magic, it uses math and critical thinking.  You also need to use spacial thinking and statistics with the placing models and figuring out how well you can do based on what you need to roll on a six-sided-dice.

The thing I like most about these games is the social aspect of them.  I have met and kept several close friends who also play these games.  Being social games, they help build more interpersonal skills, such as how to deal with others with a disagreement as well as just generalized small talk (Though they may be focused around the games).