Heleno
Smash Rookie
Greetings.
Reaction Time is a tool to mental chronometry. it is quite important to players of digital games since the faster you reply to your given circumstances, the better chances you would have. Speed is key.
In the human beings this is quite a complicated task (try the spoiler if you want to have a glimpse of the pathway...) since we have a lot of steps to account for...
...And then you move. The human reaction time is somewhere between 200 and 300 mileseconds. auditory stimuli often trigger faster responses. professional athletes can have up to 170-190ms response time, and less than 0,1% of these atheletes have a Reaction Time of around 110ms
Since Smash for WiiU runs on 60FPS, we can say that the average human player will react within 12 to 18 Frames! (a professional athlete could reach 7 Frames in the best case scenario!)
The objective of this thread is:
1. To try and find out the reaction time of our users (which is definitely a biased population! nice!)
2. To try and guess what could be done to enhance this precious response.
How to do it:
there is this website here that allows you to rapdily measure your response time. i found it way easier to use on the mobile (iPhone 6) but the creators of the website stated that perhaps mobiles introduce a minimal delay to their computing and therefore the speeds may be up to 30ms slower on mobiles... on my experience i managed to have faster times with the mobile.
this is the website:
http://www.humanbenchmark.com/tests/reactiontime - Human Benchmark: Reaction time
These are the steps we need:
if you guys would post below your reaction times (it ponders 5 consecutives tests and returns an average) we could compile a curve showing in witch percentile each player stands. it could be a nice tool, specially if we could demonstrate that pro-players have better reaction time that amateurs.
As of my second objective, to try and find means to improve reaction time, i'll dig a bit deeper into that before i can give any significant answer.
Just a little advice if you have a bad time: remember that reacting is not hte most important part of the game. it is now widely recognised that the LVL9 CPU has absolute reaction time (0ms) and it doesn't prevent the computer from being easily bodied by even the below-average player (like myself).
Also: this tool we are using perhaps has a lot of problems - and maybe our reaction time is not the one that shows when you do it - but as a method, it is easy to use, and can be used to compare ourselves without much heavy work. If i could conduct a serious study on this subject i would do it in a whole different setting: monitoring oxigen consumption, EEG, heart rate, blood pressure and body temperature. i would test subjects with a jansen machine, and would try out exams before and after caffeine and before and after several smash match-ups. now - that would be a cool study! -but not very practical to conduct.
Reaction Time is a tool to mental chronometry. it is quite important to players of digital games since the faster you reply to your given circumstances, the better chances you would have. Speed is key.
In the human beings this is quite a complicated task (try the spoiler if you want to have a glimpse of the pathway...) since we have a lot of steps to account for...
The light must enter our eyballs, reach the back of the eye, the retina, where it'll be converted into electrical information. This information will then travel all the way to the back of the brain into the occipital region where vision is processed. Then the brain will think, elaborate a complex response and prompt to move - it'll start at the pre-motor area, just to the sides of the brain (righ side for left hand, left side for right hand), and them the impulse will be approved by the motor area, and then it'll descend thru the Internal Capsule to the Brainstem, not without a little bit of verification by the cerebellum... then it'll travel to the Spinal Cord, and about the height of the neck, it'll go thru the nerves of the arm, until the very tip of the finger, where the nerve will prompt the release of chemicals in the neuromuscular junction that will make the various groups of muscles twitch into the desired movement.
(ok - don't quote me on that- it's been over a decade since i studied neuroanatomy... i might have forgotten already several steps... but i'm pretty sure the basics is as i wrote.)
It is quite a very complex stuff, and it all happens surprisingly fast once you understand how precise it is!
don't mess around and mix this stuff with arch-reflexes - when you touch a hot iron and your leg or arm jolts away from it - this sensory information and movement does not even reach the brain - it is all commanded by the spinal cord itself.
(ok - don't quote me on that- it's been over a decade since i studied neuroanatomy... i might have forgotten already several steps... but i'm pretty sure the basics is as i wrote.)
It is quite a very complex stuff, and it all happens surprisingly fast once you understand how precise it is!
don't mess around and mix this stuff with arch-reflexes - when you touch a hot iron and your leg or arm jolts away from it - this sensory information and movement does not even reach the brain - it is all commanded by the spinal cord itself.
...And then you move. The human reaction time is somewhere between 200 and 300 mileseconds. auditory stimuli often trigger faster responses. professional athletes can have up to 170-190ms response time, and less than 0,1% of these atheletes have a Reaction Time of around 110ms
Since Smash for WiiU runs on 60FPS, we can say that the average human player will react within 12 to 18 Frames! (a professional athlete could reach 7 Frames in the best case scenario!)
The objective of this thread is:
1. To try and find out the reaction time of our users (which is definitely a biased population! nice!)
2. To try and guess what could be done to enhance this precious response.
How to do it:
there is this website here that allows you to rapdily measure your response time. i found it way easier to use on the mobile (iPhone 6) but the creators of the website stated that perhaps mobiles introduce a minimal delay to their computing and therefore the speeds may be up to 30ms slower on mobiles... on my experience i managed to have faster times with the mobile.
this is the website:
http://www.humanbenchmark.com/tests/reactiontime - Human Benchmark: Reaction time
These are the steps we need:
- Click the link and open that website.
- Perform a train of 5 tests as the website recommends.
- Past below in the comments your result, don't forget to specify your age and gender as well!
if you guys would post below your reaction times (it ponders 5 consecutives tests and returns an average) we could compile a curve showing in witch percentile each player stands. it could be a nice tool, specially if we could demonstrate that pro-players have better reaction time that amateurs.
As of my second objective, to try and find means to improve reaction time, i'll dig a bit deeper into that before i can give any significant answer.
Just a little advice if you have a bad time: remember that reacting is not hte most important part of the game. it is now widely recognised that the LVL9 CPU has absolute reaction time (0ms) and it doesn't prevent the computer from being easily bodied by even the below-average player (like myself).
Also: this tool we are using perhaps has a lot of problems - and maybe our reaction time is not the one that shows when you do it - but as a method, it is easy to use, and can be used to compare ourselves without much heavy work. If i could conduct a serious study on this subject i would do it in a whole different setting: monitoring oxigen consumption, EEG, heart rate, blood pressure and body temperature. i would test subjects with a jansen machine, and would try out exams before and after caffeine and before and after several smash match-ups. now - that would be a cool study! -but not very practical to conduct.
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