Do you think HOI4 increasing your IQ?

[TheEagle1]

Hi

I am not kidding, No, Serious 100%, In old days they always say chess does increase your IQ.

In our golden age of tech, We have modern version of chess which is grand strategy games like HOI4/EU4/CK2.3

So, Do u think it does increase your IQ?
You know u fully focus while playing Paradox games, You burn every cell in your brain compare to cute games like call of duty for example!

 

[CraniumMuppet]

Sure.

At least according to what we know right now of IQ and video games there is some sort of positive correlation (Sauce, 2022 Kokkinakis 2017), as with chess (Sala, 2017).

The mechanism of play and its impact of cognition might be similar for both board games and digital games, as a lot of games deals with stuff like probabilities, cause-effect relationships etc.

What we know of intelligence is general is that it is likely not a constant, and might differ in areas (social, mathematical, spatial, linguistical etc)

Do I think playing HoI by itself will make you pass a math test? Absolutely not

 

[HmJ_JP]

I didn't notice IQ improvement, but I like the way if forces me to carefully check on a regular base all my "KPIs". Like a pilot, you need the discipline to check all your main indicators to assess the situation you're in, and not lose control. I really enjoy it.

 

[Lysenkoite]

To be fair, you have to have a very high IQ to play HoI4 anyway. The depth of strategy is extremely subtle, and without a solid grasp of combined arms warfare, most of the tactics will go over a typical player's head.

There's also Germany's nihilistic outlook, which is deftly woven into its focus tree- its personal philosophy draws heavily from 19th century Pangermanismus literature, for instance. The hardcore players understand this stuff; they have the intellectual capacity to truly appreciate the depths of the focus names, to realise that they're not just interesting - they say something deep about life.

As a consequence, people who dislike HoI4 truly ARE idiots - of course they wouldn't appreciate, for instance, the hidden meaning in Germany's focus "War with the USSR" which itself is a cryptic reference to the writings of an obscure Austrian painter in the 1920s. I'm smirking right now just imagining one of those addlepated simpletons scratching their heads in confusion as Paradox's genius unfolds itself on their computer monitors. What fools, how I pity them.

 

[marcelo r. r.]

U get tons of attention deficit(ADHD) if u play too much "strategy games", than no matter how high ur IQ is if your attention become weak, u will seems dumber or a "slow person" on real life, high IQ is useless when ur brain got tired.

But hoi4 is very chill like playing chess, few attention intensive compared even to older RTS/strategy titles, thanks to its design and UI.
The great offender in other games is the micromanaging, i reminded "empire earth" franchise, where u have to click on individual aircrafts to get them on carriers, lolz....

 

[HmJ_JP]

One word of caution: a lot of my "successes" come in fact from great strategy summarized by good youtube content. So just following a winning strategy and putting here and there some continuous improvements / fine tuning doesn't turn us genius I'm really enjoying the ones who in fact develop a complete strategy from scratch, or also turn a disastrous situation into a win. I try to mimic here, not yet reinventing the wheel.

 

[LastButterfly]

But hoi4 is very chill like playing chess

You've never played speed chess ?

 

[Mattias88]

To be fair, you have to have a very high IQ to play HoI4 anyway. The depth of strategy is extremely subtle, and without a solid grasp of combined arms warfare, most of the tactics will go over a typical player's head.

There's also Germany's nihilistic outlook, which is deftly woven into its focus tree- its personal philosophy draws heavily from 19th century Pangermanismus literature, for instance. The hardcore players understand this stuff; they have the intellectual capacity to truly appreciate the depths of the focus names, to realise that they're not just interesting - they say something deep about life.

As a consequence, people who dislike HoI4 truly ARE idiots - of course they wouldn't appreciate, for instance, the hidden meaning in Germany's focus "War with the USSR" which itself is a cryptic reference to the writings of an obscure Austrian painter in the 1920s. I'm smirking right now just imagining one of those addlepated simpletons scratching their heads in confusion as Paradox's genius unfolds itself on their computer monitors. What fools, how I pity them.

High IQ or not, HOI is still one of the dullest franchise in the history of video game franchises. Each instalment following the Führer and his pals from the german reich as they fight assorted villains has been indistinguishable from the others. Aside from the gloomy imagery, the series’ only consistency has been its lack of excitement and ineffective use of special forces, all to make strategy unstrategical, to make action seem inert.

Perhaps the die was cast when Paradox vetoed the idea of Sid Meyer developing the series; they made sure the series would never be mistaken for a work of art that meant anything to anybody, just ridiculously profitable cross-promotion for their other games. The Hearts of Iron series might be anti-Christian (or not), but it’s certainly the anti-James Bond series in its refusal of wonder, beauty and excitement. No one wants to face that fact. Now, thankfully, they no longer have to.

>a-at least EU4 was good though
"No!"
The gameplay was dreadful; the game was terrible. As I played, I noticed that every time a country prepared for war, the author wrote instead that the country "gained a casus belli."

I began marking on the back of an envelope every time that phrase was repeated. I stopped only after I had marked the envelope several dozen times. I was incredulous. Paradoxs's minds are so governed by cliches and dead metaphors that they have no other style of writing. Later I read a lavish, loving review of EU4. He wrote something to the effect of, "If these kids are playing EU4 at 11 or 12, then when they get older they will go on to play world of tanks." And he was quite right. He was not being ironic. When you play EU4 you are, in fact, trained to play world of tanks.

 

[DukofDeth]

If it is I am making damned certain to dumb myself down with beer - lots of beer! Its working, too! I spent most of two days challenging myself to get BY Beer Alone with no wars aside from the civil war for Germany! I thought I'd be real schmart and keep restarting till Britain went "Change of Course AND stuck with Eddie-8! My thought was that I'd let Britain capture Ireland and was fully expecting them to join my faction! They've done it before!

I completely forgot that Britain needs Germany to be fascist to use the focus to join them and I also forgot that "Our Place in the Sun" leave the UK with a huge negative modifier to joining Germany! Two days wasted!

Go on... laugh.

 

[Simon_9732495]

I’m sure Hoi4 is improving my IQ!
I only played 2000 hours and am already able to make paratroopers and naval invasions launch already at the second try.
I could never imagine my brain was able to achieve this level of thinking.

 

[Federkiel]

Yes, it does improve my IQ by a whopping +17% whenever i play the UK. I can research so much faster than anyone else because of the many foreign scientists that do research for their home countries and me at the same time.No need for repercussions here. Especially the astounding amount of German and Italian political refugees, especially the artists are very inspiring and speed up the Imperial military research effort in plain all areas a lot. Luckily there is an additional multiplicator effect because whenever anyone of me and my servants researches something, all others - and we are many - gets another +10% research bonus on top.

To compensate for the oversights of the dev team they have at least stacked the English focus tree with research bonuses up to the roof. I would have preferred 4x +100% instead of only 3 x +100% for only one single focus (a full 70 days, mind you!) in some cases as there remains a risk that my enemies could invest a massive effort and eventually catch up. But one has to work with what one gets for the time being.

Before anyone starts complaining: This all is well deserved as the technological breakthroughs in ww2 mady by scientists of India, South Africa, Malaya, Canada, Australia and New Zealand enjoy a lasting worldwide renown and have set landmarks to all further developments - in simply every field of scientitifc expertise.
The massive technological contribution of these nations to the general superiority of national English infantry equipment, vehicles of all kinds, tanks, aircraft, ships (especially the capital ones), large calibre guns, industrial methods and atomic research stands above every doubt.


So yes, the game makes me much more clever sometimes. I only feel dumbed down when trying to play Japan - apparently not the best idea after all.

 

[Maxwell Tornado]

To be fair, you have to have a very high IQ to play HoI4 anyway. The depth of strategy is extremely subtle, and without a solid grasp of combined arms warfare, most of the tactics will go over a typical player's head.

There's also Germany's nihilistic outlook, which is deftly woven into its focus tree- its personal philosophy draws heavily from 19th century Pangermanismus literature, for instance. The hardcore players understand this stuff; they have the intellectual capacity to truly appreciate the depths of the focus names, to realise that they're not just interesting - they say something deep about life.

As a consequence, people who dislike HoI4 truly ARE idiots - of course they wouldn't appreciate, for instance, the hidden meaning in Germany's focus "War with the USSR" which itself is a cryptic reference to the writings of an obscure Austrian painter in the 1920s. I'm smirking right now just imagining one of those addlepated simpletons scratching their heads in confusion as Paradox's genius unfolds itself on their computer monitors. What fools, how I pity them.

But do you have a HoI4 tattoo that's only for the ladies' eyes?

 

[TheEagle1]

Sure.

At least according to what we know right now of IQ and video games there is some sort of positive correlation (Sauce, 2022 Kokkinakis 2017), as with chess (Sala, 2017).

The mechanism of play and its impact of cognition might be similar for both board games and digital games, as a lot of games deals with stuff like probabilities, cause-effect relationships etc.

What we know of intelligence is general is that it is likely not a constant, and might differ in areas (social, mathematical, spatial, linguistical etc)

Do I think playing HoI by itself will make you pass a math test? Absolutely not

Yes, I am not saying it will makes u mathematician or something but I am sure it has positive effect to your brain.
It keeps your brain healthy, Everything we heard about chess > applies to HOI4 which is the chess of the twenty-first century or even better/harder.

 

[TheEagle1]

U get tons of attention deficit(ADHD) if u play too much "strategy games", than no matter how high ur IQ is if your attention become weak, u will seems dumber or a "slow person" on real life, high IQ is useless when ur brain got tired.

This.

I noticed that when I play for long hours to get HOI4 achievements for example , I get tired like if I have a real-hard university exam!!

So yeah, Everything too much is unhealthy, Balance is needed.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

What we know of intelligence is general is that it is likely not a constant, and might differ in areas (social, mathematical, spatial, linguistical etc)

i think it also depends how much one differentiates intelligence from knowledge/acquired skill

one person might grasp a math problem or spacial reasoning more easily than another. however, once both know said type of problem well, they both get the same answer. the one who grasped it more slowly initially might even be able to perform the actions of working through the problem more quickly.

intelligence when distinguished from knowledge/skill is more constant, but still not completely so. children do not necessarily demonstrate the same learning rate/ability to adapt new experience as the same person when older. and certainly, once gets old enough that they're cognitively impaired, intelligence/skill/probably even knowledge will decline eventually. thus none of these are constant, but i don't think intelligence changes as much or as frequently as the others on average.

games share some patterns, and some of those patterns/reasoning skills required to do well will track to things other than games.

U get tons of attention deficit(ADHD) if u play too much "strategy games", than no matter how high ur IQ is if your attention become weak, u will seems dumber or a "slow person" on real life, high IQ is useless when ur brain got tired.

i am not sure this tracks, especially with strategy games in particular. i am not sure how much benefit you get from hoi, but i don't see what process would make one's attention span worse by playing hoi than, for example, posting on twitter constantly, going to youtube to watch videos, or even stuff previous generation does more often like watching movies

well, there's also the fact that it's a reach to pin adhd on any of this. it seems the most common predictors of adhd are trauma (severe mental trauma or physical trauma to brain), inheriting it from a parent via genetics, or maternal drug abuse. don't think any of these track to hoi, unless you have a sibling that smacks you upside the head really hard whenever you encircle him for the 5th time or something

 

[kettyo]

As i understand it IQ is not something you can improve, it's an indicator of your innate mental abilities.

But certainly there is a correlation as someone with a low IQ can't work out or enjoy such complex logical games obviously.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

As i understand it IQ is not something you can improve, it's an indicator of your innate mental abilities.

But certainly there is a correlation as someone with a low IQ can't work out or enjoy such complex logical games obviously.

i'm not sure it's entirely true that iq is immobile. i think same person taking iq test at age 4 vs 20 will perform differently, and not just because the default average of 100 shifts with new people taking it over time. i will posit that this same person at 20 will also perform differently depending on whether or not brain development was inhibited along the way (drugs, physical trauma to brain, etc). similarly, cognitive decline will definitely lower iq test performance (includes both permanent things like dementia, but also if you were to take an iq test while intoxicated or something). these are extreme examples, but it makes it clear that it's not fully "innate", there are at least some external things that will influence it, and others (general health, nutrition, etc) that might to a lesser degree that would be challenging to prove.

iq test has predictive value, but like other tests can be gamed. at present, there isn't much incentive to inflate iq though, so most people don't do it. it is used as a proxy/estimate for general intelligence, but this only works while the fact that "most people don't do it" remains true. it is possible to practice it, and if it were done at scale, it would be significantly less representative of general intelligence and more like grades on college exams...still predictive of *something*, but not general intelligence alone.

it does seem to be true that there are levels of general intelligence below which it becomes impractical to practice/study enough to succeed at difficult cognitive tasks, though. people above that threshold for any particular activity will generally just need more or less time/effort to master said activity depending on their baseline for it.

edit: doubt spamming hoi 4 will improve iq itself. if you really want to improve iq, practice iq tests. but you're probably better off doing something you enjoy, be that hoi or otherwise.

 

[CraniumMuppet]

i'm not sure it's entirely true that iq is immobile. i think same person taking iq test at age 4 vs 20 will perform differently, and not just because the default average of 100 shifts with new people taking it over time.

IQ seems to be at least mutable by quite a lot during adolescence and teenage years, and then become more stable https://www.nature.com/articles/nature10514

Same with quality of food https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21300993/

Probably a lot of environmental conditions as well.

For the general populace I think proficiency in a a skill and willingness to work hard to improve is much more important than x difference in a IQ score.

As someone that's not very smart myself I have to believe that *gulp*

 

[TheMeInTeam]

For the general populace I think proficiency in a a skill and willingness to work hard to improve is much more important than x difference in a IQ score.

almost no question this is so. nobel prize winners at 130s iq, plenty of people with 160+ in same field that never manage. maybe some interpersonal stuff involved in that, maybe some luck, but even if you control for all of that, general intelligence is one factor among many.

i also observe it in other games. in a group of friends, one of the worst initial players at baseline for rocket league liked the game more and did mechanics grinding. he is now gm and the best player in the group. similarly, hikaru nakamura (chess super gm) scored 102 when he took an iq test.

also, once you get past the knowledge/mastery barrier of some of tasks, both in games and irl, other factors can start to dominate top levels of play. consider starcraft...not everyone can learn and real-time process everything it takes to be a top level player...but many people can. only a tiny fraction of those that can are also capable of the time investment/mechanical executing the inputs. similar deal for professional sports...the mental aspect is necessary, but not sufficient, and that guy who is similarly knowledgeable but 30kg heavier going to cause problems.

i'm not even sure "working hard" is the best predictor, it seems like people start to struggle to improve when they don't have a process that will continue to allow it. unless they change process at that point, no amount of effort will push past that barrier. at least from what i see, failing to find that process (or even to look for it) is where most perpetually intermediate (or worse) players get hung up. "what, precisely, should i do to get better at this quickly" does not seem to be something most people can answer offhand.

a smaller fraction can answer that, but acknowledge they don't want to do it. that's fine though, getting really good at something is costly. nobody can pay that cost for everything all the time.

 

[Federkiel]

i'm not sure it's entirely true that iq is immobile. i think same person taking iq test at age 4 vs 20 will perform differently, and not just because the default average of 100 shifts with new people taking it over time. i will posit that this same person at 20 will also perform differently depending on whether or not brain development was inhibited along the way (drugs, physical trauma to brain, etc). similarly, cognitive decline will definitely lower iq test performance (includes both permanent things like dementia, but also if you were to take an iq test while intoxicated or something). these are extreme examples, but it makes it clear that it's not fully "innate", there are at least some external things that will influence it, and others (general health, nutrition, etc) that might to a lesser degree that would be challenging to prove.

iq test has predictive value, but like other tests can be gamed. at present, there isn't much incentive to inflate iq though, so most people don't do it. it is used as a proxy/estimate for general intelligence, but this only works while the fact that "most people don't do it" remains true. it is possible to practice it, and if it were done at scale, it would be significantly less representative of general intelligence and more like grades on college exams...still predictive of *something*, but not general intelligence alone.

it does seem to be true that there are levels of general intelligence below which it becomes impractical to practice/study enough to succeed at difficult cognitive tasks, though. people above that threshold for any particular activity will generally just need more or less time/effort to master said activity depending on their baseline for it.

edit: doubt spamming hoi 4 will improve iq itself. if you really want to improve iq, practice iq tests. but you're probably better off doing something you enjoy, be that hoi or otherwise.

I agree. I would even go so far to say that there is some weakness in the IQ tests avaliable because if you do several different tests one after the other, you will start getting to better results each time you do one. Our brain starts to realize the systematic behind those tests. and can adapt to the task more quickly. Maybe the comparison is a little far stretched, but it's a bit like crossword puzzles. Once you have done some of them, you will get better - not only because some terms are so commonly asked for but because your 'way of thinking' gets trained at it. This does not make you a more educated person but the capabilities of abstraction do improve.

Therefore i think that HoI does indeed improve your ability to grasp abstract and math based issues and develop solutions to them. By trial and error and / or by implementing ideas that fit the logic behind the game mechanics.

In consequence - if faced with comparable logic and / or abstract dilemmas of this kind in real life / work - your competence to deal with such a situation will have improved.

However, for the real life of a commoner, this does not really make you a better person / superior worker. Being nerdy enough to play such games already says a thing as one apparently seems to enjoy solving such dilemmas anyway. Other people might very well call that an estranging quirk. To each his own...