I think this is basically true when looking at most skillsets. 95%ile is a grind, but it's mostly one of error reduction and vocabulary building. Most people ca

I think this is basically true when looking at most skillsets. 95%ile is a grind, but it's mostly one of error reduction and vocabulary building. Most people can build vocabulary just fine given time and attention, but observing and correcting errors is much harder. When a game is just outright complex like SC2 in its decision making(hundreds of units and structures that could be individually commanded), all the skills needed to reach 95%ile boil down to rote technique: "good builds", "meta strats", etc. This is where most video games sit, since this kind of overt complexity is something you can learn in little nibbles: A is more powerful than B in situation X. In comparison, games like pinball have relatively little going on in their vocabulary: there are plenty of techniques and rulesets, but much of the good strategy boils down to "hit accurately" and "recover successfully", and those are entirely sources of error, reduced only through many hours of play to find methods of hitting and recovering with good expected value and low risk - sweet spots on a playfield and a deep understanding of the physics to enable combo setups. If you have accuracy, you need only have a small layer of rules and shots knowledge to smoke tournaments. With little to consciously memorize to overcome the skill gap, casual players conclude that pinball is "just random".