Anecdote: I played a ton of Starcraft Brood War and Starcraft 2 growing up. Strategy. Hang eye coordination. Deceive. Reaction time. Anticipating enemy moves. Working with team (in team games). These were all part of every game. I got as far as grandmaster level in Starcraft 2 1v1.<p>After a 3-4 hour playing session, my brain would get completely fried. I interpreted that as getting a brain exercise.<p>Fast forward to my adult life, I noticed that I'm a faster thinker than average and able to arrive at conclusions quicker than my colleagues (who are all very smart), while also often thinking a few steps ahead of them. I've always risen fast at work mostly because of this.<p>I don't know if it's just natural IQ or if my video game playing past helped me. It could also be that higher IQ people on average play more videos games? Maybe more strategy games? And those who are have higher IQ might continue to play, due to success, and reach a very high level?<p>There was another recent study that showed Starcraft players had better cognitive abilities than The Sims players.[0] But again, it's not clear of Starcraft made those people more capable or more capable people choose to play Starcraft more often.<p>[0]<a href="https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0070350" rel="nofollow">https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal...</a>