What Genre takes the most "skill"?

[Veleste]

All genres take skill but at higher levels I would say that RTS take the most skill. There's more to take into account and do and it's about managing your resources while trying to out think your opponent in a way that fighters and fps' just don't match.

Fighters and fps' both require you to out think your opponent - yes - but resource management is no where near as complex not to mention the overwhelming micro and macro you need to engage in. You're not just controlling one guy, you're controlling hundreds vs hundreds of smaller guys.

 

[Communist partisan]

Point N' click adventure games I suck so bloody hard on those things so I don't even try anymore.

 

[Kif]

City building like Sim City.

There's a level of skill, tactics, micro management and knowledge that I've not seen in other games.

 

[Malyc]

Any simulation type racing game, especially if its on the hardest difficulty.
(The only NFS game that counts for this is shift.)

 

[oranger]

A hardcore bullet hell game...fighters are just repeating combinations of buttons, and RTS's are about learning specific strategies and doing them quickly but bullet hell shooters require real reflexes.

 

[Onyx Oblivion]

I'd have to say fighting games. Anyone who actually believes that anyone can be beaten by a button masher, obviously lacks "skill" themselves.

 

[Nikolaz72]

RTS Is this really a question?

 

[TPiddy]

I find anything that requires a survival instinct I generally suck at... "What? You mean I can't just chase after that guy and melee him to death? Why not? Cuz he has a gun? Why does that matter?"

 

[obliviondoll]

I'd have to say fighting games. Anyone who actually believes that anyone can be beaten by a button masher, obviously lacks "skill" themselves.

Not going to say you're totally wrong, but I have several arguments against you.

1. Online multiplayer adds lag, which adds unpredictability and randomness to the fight. Other than online, you're more close to being right. But there are a few other points to cover.

2. Tiers. Almost every fighting game has characters who are recognised as high-tier, characters who are recognised as low-tier, and some have characters who are recognised as button-mashing characters (more on this later). In most fighting games, an expert player using a low-tier character will rarely beat a decent player who's decent, and using a high-tier character. Forcing people to use the best character isn't skill. It's an unbalanced game.

Side note: The Armored Core games also do this, and a handful of high-tier equipment gets banned from tournaments soon after each new game comes out, and a handful of low-tier items are almost never used. But the level of customisation leaves plenty of room within the high-tier items for play style and strategic depth to play a part.

3. Button-mashing friendly characters. Not all fighting games have these, Eddy from Tekken 3 is probably the most painfully obvious example. I've seen a button masher playing as him score several consecutive perfect rounds against a guy who routinely wins tournaments. Often they just have really easy moves to string together into combos, sometimes the character is recognised as being so high-tier they're unfair to use in tournaments.

None of this actually rules out skill entirely, because a highly skilled player will MORE OFTEN THAN NOT (there are exceptions to this) be ALMOST unbeatable (with HUGE emphasis on ALMOST) against a button masher. This is true for basically every genre of game, assuming the game is decently made.

But, good fighting games, while requiring their own specific brand of skill, require better reactions, while good strategy games require more strategic thought. It's not about requiring more skill, it's about requiring different kinds of skill.

 

[suhlEap]

the first ninja gaiden. you have to be a ninja to complete that game... completing it makes you a fully qualified ninja.

Being a ninja is about not being recognised while achieving your goal, usually assassination, spying, or theft. If you want a ninja game, play Shinobido: Way of the Ninja. Assassin's Creed teaches you more about being ninja than "Ninja" Gaiden does. Driving through a spray shop to change you car's appearance is more ninja than Gaiden. Or any Metroid or Zelda games, for that matter.

wow take a joke. i don't actually believe you have to be a ninja. and besides, this topic isn't about that, it's about games that require skill, something which is definately required in ninja gaiden. perhaps you weren't skilled enough to finish it, and that's why you seem so angry at it.

 

[Rhiehn]

Whatever games I play...

But really:
FPS = Reflexes
RTS = Refexes and Knowledge
RPG = Knowledge and Patience
Strategy = Skill

Exactly how does Strategy require skill and Real Time Strategy not?

 

[Skeptic]

I'd go with RTSs. They require a high level of strategic and tactical thinking, mental agility, micro and macro management, speed, precision,...

And yeah, I suck at them.

 

[veloper]

RTS.

It's the only genre that requires heavy multitasking.

Then you need fast reflexes. At high competition levels you also need to be able to think fast. Finally also alot of units, abilities and counters to learn about.
No other genre has all this.

 

[Ildecia]

Starcraft, the original. Management, multi-tasking, speed, meta game understanding.

that's it.

It requires such a wide variety of skills at such a high level to be able to compete even near the top.

Also, creativity, understanding of all sorts of timing windows, game sense, amazing micro and understanding of not only doing things, but WHY you do things.

the main problem with the original Starcraft was that its really hard for them to NOT make a balanced AI without making it omnipotent.

but other people; now that takes a lot of creativity and one hell of a strategy

OP: i would have to agree with almost everyone and say RTS, but when i played muramasa: the demon blade on Shiguri mode (1 health; everything is 5x harder) it was so frustrating.... but also obscenely challenging

 

[Gingernerd]

Taking into account my biases as a near pure RPG gamer; I actually think RPGs tend to require the least skill, simply because you can always level up and get better equipment and abilities.

I know there are many valid contrary arguments for this but compare one of the hardest RPG bosses ever E.G Satan on Digital Devil saga 2. It requires hours upon hours of leveling and maxing all stats and then still requires great luck and judgement.

what about a game where you dont level up at all, you cant really get much stronger but you still must overcome some kind of superboss? at least you dont have to spend 30+ hours on leveling up. leveling up isn't really a skilled practice.

 

[Pebkio]

Most video games are the expression of interactivity dealing with pattern-recognition and proper timing. Sometimes the pattern is more complicated but the timing is slower (see: RPGs). Sometimes the timing is faster but the pattern is more simple (see: FPS).

Therefore, games that are the most challenging... thereby taking the most skill... are games that employ faster timing with more complicated patterns. A few genres can represent this:

Fighting Games (at least those with nothing but 5+ button combos)
Rhythm games (ala Guitar Hero on expert with a fast song)

However, all of the need for skill can be replaced with memorization. And so, we'll have to think of a genre that actually removes the possibility of memorization while still holding to complicated patterns and fast pacing.

A combination of those three doesn't exist, in fact, I can only think of one genre that removes memorization:

---

The award for "Takes the Most Skill" goes to the genre known as "Real Life".

It's just too bad that, at most times, it's too hard to be enjoyed as a medium for story-telling...

 

[obliviondoll]

RTS.

It's the only genre that requires heavy multitasking.

Then you need fast reflexes. At high competition levels you also need to be able to think fast. Finally also alot of units, abilities and counters to learn about.
No other genre has all this.

A lot of MMOs and some turn-based strategy games prove you wrong here.

MMOs don't necessarily have lots of UNITS, but they have more abilities than most RTSes have units, abilities and counters combined. Then an equally large number of counters.

Customisation-heavy Mech games (usually first- or third-person shooters) like the Mechwarrior and Armored Core games can require a fair amount of multitasking and huge amount of strategic thought as well. And again, have more parts and counters than RTS games. Especially Armored Core.

 

[Dexiro]

Fighting games need some stupidly fast reflexes and precision, maybe even strategy.

I'd kind of agree with RTS too but that's just because i fail at them. Suck at multitasking and always feel under pressure.

 

[veloper]

RTS.

It's the only genre that requires heavy multitasking.

Then you need fast reflexes. At high competition levels you also need to be able to think fast. Finally also alot of units, abilities and counters to learn about.
No other genre has all this.

A lot of MMOs and some turn-based strategy games prove you wrong here.

MMORPGs let you control only 1 unit. Little multitasking there. Easy as shitting.

Turn-based strategy have zero multitasking due to their very nature.