The Victory Was That Close, Was It?

Ever been in a game, where you were sure you’ll win? In the end your opponent manages to steal the victory just under your nose? It sure feels great, when you steal a victory that way and it feels like sh*t when you lose like that. I believe there are two main points to be taken from such events.

First one is that nothing is guaranteed. You could be the best. Give your best. Play with all your hearth and still lose. Respectively, the other way around. No matter how desperate the situation is you can still pull it through. What’s the moral, for me it’s that hope is very important. We must never lose it, in order to give our best. Try harder. Make it count.

The second is that skill is not everything. One could be very good and very arrogant. So, attitude matters as well. If you have the right attitude, work hard and never lose hope. Then, even if someone manages to steal the victory, you’ll find what you’ve done wrong and correct it.

What’s the point in these two? Stop complaining and start learning and mastering the games and skills that matter to you the most. Act accordingly to your current circumstances and try to make the best out of them. Do I manage to keep this attitude every time? Of course, not! But I do try to be aware of my hater half.

I’d love to hear a situation like the ones above and how you’ve reacted. Do share them in the comments below.

As always, keep learning and may the Force be with you!

How Do You Call It: Failure or Experiment?

Many of us, have this attitude that we must never fail. Everything must miraculously happen from your first try. And if you fail, the world is going to end? 

On the other hand, in games like Heroes of the Storm, Civilization 6 and many others you should constantly improve. Try new things. Check what works and what doesn’t. I call these checks… experiments. Lately I’m trying to see all activities as experiments. I’ll share with you my observations, (after all, they are a result of an experiment, right?) about two areas of our lives. 

First area is games, of course. I was recently trying to beat Immortal difficulty of Civ6 (managed to beat a computer on duel map two days ago!). It was a huge effort of trial and error, or in other words, experimenting with different start up sequences of production. Different city production management. Different approach for first districts. In summary, lots and lots of experiments. Every one of those managed to change my approach to the game just a little bit. Note that I’m not talking about any big change happening at once. So, this is the hidden power of experiments. Every one of them will give you small piece of new information which you can adapt to your style. Piece by piece with some patience, curiosity and consistency you can manage to beat the challenge.

Second area is work. Let’s see if the top approach is working here. I’m currently reading Work Rules by Laszlo Bock and I’m fascinated how Google managed to experiment with different approaches and come up with solutions that work well for them. Laszlo says that they didn’t come up with the “end solution” at once, instead they iterated different approaches, experimented with different options and last, but not least they’re constantly monitoring and evolving their approach!

So, be more experimental and don’t be afraid of “failures”, because there is no such thing. We learn little bits of information from each experiment. We as human beings make it success or failure, for an experiment the end result is just that: a result. Try for one week to consider everything you do as an experiment. Then check the results and if they are not what you’ve expected change the experiment, learn from it and adapt the new one.

Keep learning and may the Force be with you!

Everyday a Game-Like Approach. What?!

Have you ever wondered why you remember some things so vividly and others are hard to come to mind? Well, what’s been proved by science is that every memory tied to a powerful emotion, whether positive or negative will be more easily accessible. This is because the brain thinks it’s important, whether to keep you safe, or to give you pleasure. Now what’s the link between this and games huh?

Some time ago, I stumble across the concept of “Cone of Learning” in a TEDx talk by Robert Kiyosaki. Here is the cone itself:

Percent of information contained after engaging in the corresponding activity

As we play video games we are deeply involved. Especially if it’s an action or action oriented RPG game. I’ve been there you know. Watching the screen and feeling as if you’re the main character. This is engagement! I’m sure you remember those moments. I believe this is the first principle of mastering a new skill - being deeply involved in some activity. If we manage to apply this engagement in our learning process, then we will learn as fast as a child. You see, to a child everything is a game. Why not apply children’s dedication to our own activities?

Alas, it’s not enough to make something once and become a master at it. Children fail often while they learn. Because of this, they become very good at acquiring new skills fast. Do you remember save/load repetitions when trying again and again, and again to defeat that boss? So, the second most important part of mastering a skill through games is consistency.

We must be consistent in our game-like view of the world to reap the rewards. I’m still struggling with this idea, so let’s give it a try together.

What can you approach like a game for 1 week? Do it and let me know what happened.

Keep learning and may the Force be with you!

The 80-20 rule (Focus on only a few things)

Few months ago while I was developing my heroes in Star Wars Galaxy of Heroes I ended up in a situation where progress seems to be sluggish. I was stuck in one place and everything which I did brings forth mediocre results. It's not difficult to imagine I wasn't happy about the situation (to put it lightly) and started searching the internet what better players are doing differently. While I was reading articles and watching video clips, as if someone slapped me from behind - I got my answer: “You are trying to develop all heroes at the same time and you don’t have the resources to develop them all!” … my initial reaction was: “Well how come I didn’t see this earlier!” After a few moments of contemplation, I thought that the way I felt while developing those heroes is the same as when I’m overloaded with tasks or huge pile of materials to learn (happens all the time with datasheets and so on).

I’m perfectly sure that you’ve been in this situation, except if you’re some kind of god of course, where you don’t know which task to take first because of the huge abundance of them. This situation usually paralyzes the actions. Back to the story. I decided to check out YouTube and google for some better players who decided to share information. Luckily, I found several and decided to take actions towards their advice, to try how it will work (more on trying topic in another post). So, after watching some videos I sit down and identified the zones in which I’d like to see improvement. Then I sit down and write all the heroes which I believe were worthwhile to develop and started working on them only (at least to some decent level). I did see result very soon, about 1-2 weeks after I did this and I still keep the list to this day and refine it with every new update. Now if we turn this to our overwhelming days: work, sport, games, children, wife, dog … which one to focus on first? Well above are three steps I took to overcome this problem, you could give them a try and share your story in the comments below:

1. Identify the zones which you’d like to improve – in other words, prioritize your life
2. See what’s needed to improve those zones
3. Take actions! Or like Toni Robbins says: “Massive Actions!”

If you have another approach let me know in the comments below. If those steps don’t work also let me know. I’ll be happy to discuss this.

P.S. Go and google out the 80-20 rule, I intentionally added it only in the title.

Keep learning and may the Force be with you!