[oilywater]

This game is the perfect tool for testing your problem solving skills. It puts you in a new framework and tests your cognition.

Portal, The Talos Principle, all have the same goal.

I wonder if people could become excellent problem solver by playing these games instead of honing the skills in the mathematics, physics or similar frameworks.

[agentultra]

You may begin to realize that you are doing maths without realizing it. Thinking mathematically is quite natural for a curious, motivated person. It's writing down these thoughts which people find difficult. It's not easy for us to be precise!

It could augment your skills in mathematics. Most people are much better than they think they are or are given credit for.

I gave my niece the game, Set, over the holidays. She was able to beat adult players after a few rounds. Similar experiences with http://dragonbox.com as well.

[oilywater]

I believe it is called problem solving, not math.

Mathematics is a framework for problem solving which requires problem solving skills and knowledge of mathematics.

I believe anyone using a piece of paper and writing down their thinking is doing problem solving on problems that are presented in the game. Yes, it is probably equivalent to some algorithms present in computer science but they are (if not familiar) discovering everything by themselves.

The game provides the framework for problem solving, so instead of having knowledge of math/algorithms, you build that knowledge yourself and improve your problem solving skills as you go.

The way math is commonly taught seems to be knowledge oriented - which leaves a lot of people completely stuck when it comes to problem solving.

That's why I'm interested if you could, playing these games, improve your general problem solving skills, so that only thing you have to do, when you start with a different framework, is to get the knowledge - but your thinking previously trained without it and it should work now when you're familiar with the framework.

At least that is what I would expect form a general problem solver that got one's skills by solving problems in maths, or physics. I would assume that they could solve problems in other areas if they knew the terminology, if they acquired knowledge.

[agentultra]

Believe what you will but a rose by any other name...

Maths is problem solving, recognizing patterns, and the ability to express those ideas and solutions. The language is rather difficult to learn but most people can do the former intuitively without being told they're doing maths.

Without giving away the game there are beautiful mathematical concepts built into it. You may not realize that as you encounter new puzzles and constraints you are internalizing a vocabulary for the patterns you start to recognize. Once you start writing down this language you will appear to be doing what people recognize as maths. However I find myself content with simply having the conversation... for now.

It is certainly tempting to start formulating a proper solution to some of the puzzles and write programs to test out my theories.

Regardless of what you want to call it I think you can certainly hone your "problem solving" skills in this game.