An Examination of Skill pt.7
Wednesday, May 19, 2010 at 3:07PM
Richard Terrell (KirbyKid) in Mega Man, Skill, StarCraft, Super Monkey Ball, Super Smash Brothers
Dexterity is a part of every video game we can get our hands on. To give you a better idea how each facet of dexterity can influence game design, I pulled together this list. 
 

Tetris analógico // Analogical Tetris from Esferobite-DSK on Vimeo.

Tetris with more dexterity!

Speed

 

Strength

Most games don't feature inputs that emphasis strength dexterity because traditional controllers simply aren't designed for it. The on/off buttons, analog sticks, touch screens, and mouse controls dominate gaming. Fortunately, this generation has motion control, which gives designers an opportunity to do more with dexterity than ever before. 

 

Stamina 

 

Control

 

Harmony

 

Efficiency 

Efficiency is hard to measure for games that don't stress stamina and strength dexterity skills. Because games that stress such skills are rare efficiency isn't typically a huge factor. In other words, because the average gamer can manipulate buttons, sticks, keyboards, mice, and touch screens for hours on end there's not much of a point refining the motions of general play. 

On a smaller scale making inputs more efficient is something dedicated gamers do all the time to improve their game. Just check out this video discussing arcade pad grips. Efficiency can be linked to all the other facets of dexterity skill. Often times, at the limits of the other facets efficiency drops.

 

In part 8 of this series, I'll unveil the next game from B.E.S. 

Article originally appeared on Critical-Gaming Network (https://critical-gaming.com/).
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