A new report has been published that claims to reveal where in the world is "best at playing video games". And I'm just gonna rip this particular plaster off quickly guys - England didn't make the top ten. Still, we're great at... all kinds of things, I'm sure.
Data-focused mobile gaming publisher Kwalee researched top-ranking achievements from over 16,000 games in an effort to discover which country can claim bragging rights when it comes to being the very best at gaming. To be clear, by this, they mean "most-skilled". In many instances, being the "best" at playing video games just means you're more likely to be able to stay up all night with a copy of Final Fantasy VII Remake and a massive bottle of Dr Pepper. I definitely didn't do this recently.
Using data available on speedrun.com, Kwalee drew from 42,000 recorded achievements that provided insights into everything from the fastest competition times to high scores. Countries were ranked based on how many of these achievments residents had scored, and the results were divided by population size to ensure fair scoring.
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Finland, quite possibly one of the most gorgeous countries on Earth, took the top spot. Quite why anyone who lives in such a beautiful place stays in to play video games is well beyond me, but congratulations to them all the same. Finland was followed by Canada and Sweden, while the United States ranked 6th.
England just missed the cut, coming in at 12th behind Germany's respectable 11th place. Great times for Scotland though, who comfortably made the top ten with 8th place. You can see the full top ten below.
- Finland
- Canada
- Sweden
- New Zealand
- Australia
- USA
- Netherlands
- Scotland
- Ireland
- France
So, what does this all mean in the grand scheme of things? Not a lot really, but at least Finland has bragging rights for a bit. There are all kinds of factors in what makes someone "good" at gaming, and even then surely it's usually an entirely subjective term? Yes, one person can be better than another at Dark Souls or Modern Warfare, but just because someone got through a game like The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt quicker doesn't always mean that they're of a higher skill.
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Interestingly, the data was broken down a little further. For example, Scotland is apparently the best at driving games (thanks, Forza Horizon 4), while New Zealand can now lay claim to being the best at Call Of Duty. Elsewhere, Japan is best at fighting games, but the UK apparently reigns supreme when it comes to Tekken.
The whole thing makes for interesting (if slightly ridiculous) reading. You can check out the full findings, as well as some more detailed breakdowns of the data, right here.
Featured Image Credit: Activision/FromSoftware