Every gamer has been there. People pass your favorite hobby off as violent, derisive, and nonconstructive, never stopping to look below the surface. News teams and parental associations continually blast your favorite games, for no reason other than games being an easy target for the world's problems. You argue until your throat is positively raw. "It's not just obscenities and violence! There is real substance here!" To no avail. But every once and a while, you find someone that is willing to heed your words, and they come out of the experience all the more educated. The next time you find yourself defending your passion for video games, try one of these 10 ways that prove why video games actually make you smarter...
10. Resource Management
Many people have been cursed with the inability to effectively manage the resources they have at their disposal. Ever lived from one paycheck to the next? I have. Spent the last of your wages on something you could probably do without? Yup, me too. Do you lack the willpower to stay away from your more... addictive hobbies? Don't we all? If you've played any amount of video games, you will realize that resource management is an essential part of nearly all of them. You have to make crucial decisions at almost every turn. In many of the earlier RPGs, you were faced with standard problems. "Should I use this last potion knowing I won't be seeing another shop for quite a while?" "Do I have enough health items to warrant spending these last few magic points on this destructive spell?" And then you have the ammo problem, which plagues nearly every game with re-loadable weapons. Use these last few bullets, or opt for a more conservative stealth kill? The decision is yours to make, and you'll be much better off in gaming and in life if you consider all of your options.