Game sense, to me, is having every bit of information you might need, at your fingertips. Predicting where enemies might be, knowledge of the map and positioning, awareness of your resources, and many more. When all of these are combined, it is a deadly combination. This is game sense.
Game sense come from experience. A lot of experience. When you go through dozens of different scenarios and encounters in-game, you are going to learn from them and improve. But we don’t want to spend hundreds (more like thousands) of hours developing game sense. How can you develop it faster?
1. Learn From The Pros
Professional players, already went through thousands of different encounters, dozens of different scenarios, and they learned from them. They dedicated years to learning and practice. They have more experience then me and you combined. We should use it to our advantage.
Go into Youtube or Twitch, and put on your favorite pro player. Don’t watch them solely for fun. Really try to learn from them. Analyze their actions. Learn their strategies. Study their weapon choices, abilities, and so on.
Put Yourself In Their Shoes
When in a clutch situation or just a general scenario you want to improve on, do this. Stop the VOD and think about your action plan. What would you do if you were in their shoes. Really think about it and use your imagination. What abilities would you use? Where would you go? Flank? Camp? Push? After you’ve played the full scenario in your head, resume the VOD and see what he does. Compare your action plan to the pro-player’s action plan and analyze it. Learn from it. And adjust your gameplay accordingly. I am not saying that everything that a pro player does on the stream is the best option. They do make mistakes sometimes, but that’s when your judgement comes into play. Really try to understand what is going on. Doing this and later hopping into a match will develop your game sense 100x than just playing the game.
Predict The Gameplay
You should try to predict what will happen in the game. Predict everything. From the enemies counter-plays to the pro player off-angles. You shouldn’t take anything for granted. The pro player is pushing a site? Predict what will happen. Look at his teammates. Will the enemies push him aggressively? Will they let him plant and then retake the site? What is the pro doing to counter that? What is the pro using in-order to get the site? There is so much to learn here. The key is to just be open to learning. Question everything. Analyze the little things. The improvement will be immeasurable.
2. Analyze Your Own Gameplay
Record your gameplay and watch it afterwards. When you are playing a video game, most of the time you are not fully aware of what is going on. This is because of the amount of pressure and tasks you have to do at once. Aiming, controlling your resources, predicting your enemies position etc. You are playing based on habits and actions that you are used to. There is so much going on that you can’t fully commit yourself to every detail. You are under pressure to perform, and you can’t notice everything. When you are watching the VOD, by looking at a spectator’s perspective, finding out the mistakes and errors in your gameplay is way easier. You may notice many things that you weren’t aware of, because you are looking at it from another perspective. For example, you are not noticing that most of your deaths are because of over-committing to gunfights, or lack of control of your resources. These are just examples and the list goes on and on.
Even when I am recording some cool clips, and I am editing them so I can send them to my friends, I can see some errors in my gameplay that I’ve never thought about. Even at those 20 second clips, you may notice some room for improvement. So make sure you utilize that. Review yourself and review the pro players for maximum benefits.
Learn On The Go
Even when you play, you should learn from your mistakes. A mistake in most cases is your death. Analyze your death. What could you do better? Did you over commit to a gunfight? Did you push for no reason? Did play too aggressively? Did you look at the minimap? The moment you die, stay calm. Take a deep breath and look at the facts. What could you do better? What you should’ve avoided?
Every time me and my squad die (Warzone), while we are queuing into a new match, we are thinking and analyzing our death. What happened and how to avoid it next time? Life is all about learning. Video games are no different.
3. Put Your Knowledge To The Test
Don’t forget that getting better is a product of experience. You have to put your knowledge to the test. Keep playing, keep practicing and you will get far. Pro players reached the pro scene because they put thousands of hours into video games. They went through a never-ending learning process. They put in the work, they put in the hours, and they got far. If you want to do the same, it is no different. Keep playing, keep learning. Consistency is key.
Conclusion
So, to develop a pro game sense, you need to learn from the pros. Analyze their decision-making and put yourself in their shoes. Try to predict their gameplay. Then, analyze your own gameplay and keep learning from your mistakes. In the end, keep playing and put your knowledge to the test. Remember, game sense is built from experience.
Photo by Fredrick Tendong on Unsplash
