Add first transcript: micro-mezzo-macro competitive games framework

gaming/micro-mezzo-macro-competitive-games.md

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+---
+title: "Once you see this, You'll see Competitive Games Differently"
+url: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgHvdCcmQ4o
+channel: unknown (yt-dlp metadata unavailable at time of transcription)
+duration: "14:01"
+transcribed_at: 2026-08-11
+transcription_tool: whisper-cli (whisper.cpp) via MacWhisper ggml-medium model
+category: gaming
+tags:
+  - game-theory
+  - competitive-games
+  - micro-mezzo-macro
+  - framework
+  - CS2
+  - Apex
+  - Overwatch
+  - Rocket-League
+summary: >
+  Introduces a three-axis framework for understanding competitive games: Micro
+  (execution/aim/muscle-memory), Mezzo (mind-games/probability/reading people),
+  and Macro (systems/routing/optimal strategy). The clearest way to identify
+  which axis dominates a game is the "cheat test" — what single cheat would
+  most break it? Most big competitive games sit in all three, but in different
+  ratios. Applies the framework to CS2, Overwatch, Apex, and Rocket League with
+  input from domain experts. Closes with the insight that players have natural
+  leans toward one axis, and the games that frustrate you are probably demanding
+  the axis you haven't developed.
+---
+
+# Once you see this, You'll see Competitive Games Differently
+
+**YouTube:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgHvdCcmQ4o  
+**Duration:** 14:01  
+**Transcribed:** 2026-08-11 via whisper-cli (MacWhisper ggml-medium model)
+
+---
+
+## Transcript
+
+You know what's kind of weird?
+When someone asks what kind of games do you like, most people struggle to answer.
+You say "tactical shooters", and they respond "oh, so you must like Counter-Strike, Valorant,
+and Rainbow Six Siege", and you say "eh, actually only Counter-Strike".
+You say "strategy games", and someone recommends you Civilization when you wanted something
+more like Hearthstone.
+Game genres are kind of broken.
+But I think there's a better way to think about this, and it's a much simpler way to
+look at games.
+And once you see it, you'll see games much more differently.
+But let's start somewhere everyone can agree.
+Every game has something that separates the good players from the bad ones.
+Sometimes it's pure skill, your reflexes, your aim, your timing.
+Sometimes it's information, knowing things the other person doesn't.
+Sometimes it's something harder to name.
+The mental side, reading people, managing randomness, and adapting on the fly.
+These aren't just different skills, they are fundamentally different kinds of gameplay,
+and most games mix them together in different amounts.
+So let me give you three words.
+Micro, Mezzo, Macro.
+Now here's where it gets interesting, and a little uncomfortable.
+What if I told you the clearest way to understand what a game is actually testing, is to think
+about how you'd cheat in it.
+If you wanted to completely break a game, to make it trivially easy, what cheat would
+you use?
+The answer to that question tells you more about a game than any genre label ever could.
+So let's put this to the test.
+What is micro?
+Micro is the execution layer, it's your aim, your timing, your movement, your muscle memory.
+An example of a micro cheat looks like an aimbot, perfect inputs every single time.
+If a game can be broken by perfect execution, that's a micro game.
+osu!, Geometry Dash, Aim Trainers, and Tetris are a few examples.
+You can cheat in osu! with perfect cursor tracking, you can cheat in Geometry Dash with
+perfect jumps.
+These are execution cheats, and you can feel the microness when you play them.
+Mezzo is the probability layer, the place where mind games exist.
+You're reacting to the unpredictable nature of people, not mechanics.
+A mezzo cheat looks like stream sniping, knowing someone's habits before they show them, reading
+cooldowns, seeing things you shouldn't see yet.
+The best example for the purest mezzo game is Rock Paper Scissors.
+There's zero execution skill, it's entirely mental, and probability.
+Among Us also runs on mezzo, so does Liar's Bar.
+Even the stock market is built around this layer.
+If you wanted to cheat in Among Us, you'd stream snipe to know who the imposter is.
+If you wanted to cheat in stocks, you'd insider trade.
+Notice how none of these cheats involve executing anything better, they involve knowing something
+you shouldn't.
+Intro is the systems layer, it's your routing, your resource management, and your win condition.
+You can think of it like the mathematically correct way of winning the game.
+A macro cheat looks like a chess engine, economy automation, or you can imagine like a perfect
+coach telling you exactly what to do.
+Pure macro games are almost mathematical puzzles.
+Think Factorio, PolyBridge, Connect4, Tic Tac Toe.
+Once you find the optimal solution, the game is solved.
+But here's where it gets really interesting.
+Most games aren't just one of these, they're combinations of them, and the combination
+tells you everything about what kind of game it is.
+So let's look at Micro plus Macro.
+These tend to be single player precision games.
+You need to know the optimal solution and execute it fast.
+Think Rubik's Cube Speedrunning, Mario 64, Jump King, and Getting Over It.
+If you were to have a perfect micro cheat in Alderaan Ring, you'd have perfect dodges.
+But if you were to have a perfect macro cheat, you'd use the mathematically optimal build.
+But there's one weird multiplayer outlier here, 8 Ball Pool.
+There's a mathematically optimal shot, and then there's the skill of actually hitting
+it.
+But even though it is player versus player, the room for mind games doesn't really exist.
+And I think it's a rare exception.
+Next let's look at Micro plus Mezzo.
+This is PvP skill expression games.
+These tend to be your fighting games, Street Fighter, Tekken, Smash Bros, Brawlhalla.
+Your skill matters, and reading your opponent matters.
+But also you have some other examples like Mario Kart, like the micro of driving, and
+the mezzo of random items and unpredictable opponents.
+We even see some unique games like Tetris 99.
+The original Tetris is pure micro.
+But Tetris 99 also involves mezzo, because now you're managing who to send garbage to.
+You also have physics based PvP, like Fall Guys and Gang Beasts.
+Which also fits into Micro plus Mezzo.
+The next one is Mezzo plus Macro.
+These are the mind and math games.
+Using Karthstone, TFT, Pokemon VGC, and Battleship.
+Now chess is theoretically a pure macro game, but at the human level, there's a massive
+mezzo component.
+You're optimizing for your specific opponent's habits.
+That's why studying opponent matters in high level chess.
+And then there are some weird outliers.
+Bellatro is a single player game, but it's also mezzo-macro because the RNG of the card
+combines with the math of maximizing your hand.
+You're not executing anything difficult, but you have to pick and choose your cards
+wisely, and play to their biggest strength.
+Phasmophobia is also a weird game that fits into mezzo-macro.
+It's a co-op game, but it fits here because you're deducing a ghost using evidence, which
+is macro, while the ghost's behavior has RNG, mezzo.
+Although I suspect non-PvP mezzo-macro games slowly converge towards pure macro over time.
+Once players fully map the RNG, it stops feeling uncertain and becomes a speedrun problem.
+And then there's the middle, all three overlapping.
+This is where the biggest competitive games live.
+League of Legends, Dota 2, CS2, Valorant, Overwatch, Marvel Rivals, Rocket League, Apex,
+Rainbow Six, World of Warcraft.
+But here's the thing, they're not all the same balance.
+And the cheat test tells you how exactly they differ.
+So let's use Counter-Strike as an example.
+Can aimbots win a game of CS completely alone?
+Almost certainly yes.
+If you never miss, most duels are over before they start.
+That makes micro extremely high in CS2.
+But what about x-ray, seeing through walls?
+Pros have done experiments with one player with x-ray versus five without x-ray.
+The five still usually win, but the x-ray player takes rounds they have no business
+taking.
+This makes mezzo very high in CS2 too.
+Which means macro, the strategic layer, is relatively the lowest.
+CS isn't about long-term economy optimization the way MOBAs are.
+The rounds are short and the execution is everything.
+But let's try this test with Overwatch.
+And right away we see a unique case, because the answer actually depends on your role.
+But since it varies so heavily by character and roles, I decided to ask someone who knows
+about Overwatch way better than I do.
+So if you compare all three like maxed out versions of the perfect version of it, like
+a cheat version of it, which one would have like the highest win rate and how would the
+distribution be?
+I would just say support is more macro heavy, DPS is more micro heavy, and then tank is
+more mezzo heavy.
+Also the way that it works is you have offense, defense and control.
+Control refers to like map control, offense refers to offensive options, defense refers
+to defensive options.
+And a character's mixture or like kind of design links to this concept of offense, defense
+and control.
+Tanks tend to depend on more control, supports more defense, DPS more offense.
+And if you actually like dissect each individual hero, they will have different like varying
+levels or varying focuses on offense, defense or control.
+So I'm thinking about it like this, right?
+If you were to give each role one cheat, you would give aimbot to DPS and for tank you
+would give the ability to see enemy cooldowns as a perfect cheat, right?
+And for supports you would have a coach or an engine, perfect coach.
+That's perfect, that's exactly perfect.
+And also, especially in Overwatch, because it's 5v5, because you only have one tank.
+Like if you can win every duel as a tank, that's kind of like a free win for your team.
+But what about Apex?
+Apex sits remarkably balanced across all three.
+If you think about which player is most likely to win, a guy with perfect aimbot, a guy with
+perfect wallhacks or a guy with perfect ring knowledge, all three actually has a pretty
+good chance of winning the game.
+If you have aimbot, you can easily kill anyone rotating, but any close range fight will tend
+to go either way.
+But with perfect wallhacks, you can use your needs and abilities to take a team down, but
+you'll still lose to someone with good ring positioning.
+But even with perfect ring information, you could still easily die to someone who wants
+to contest that position.
+Let's test this in a really unique game.
+Rocket League
+I asked pro Rocket League coach Luke on his answer to this thought experiment, and this
+was his response.
+Basically, perfect micro or perfect mechanics in Rocket League would be defined as taking
+the ball from point A to point B as quickly and as efficiently as possible.
+Like how in a first person shooter, aimbot moves the crosshair to the target as quickly
+and as efficiently as possible.
+For Rocket League, smarts cannot make up for the fact that a more mechanical person can
+just take the ball to the open net far more than someone with less mechanics.
+This makes Rocket League heavily micro dominant.
+But after micro being the most dominant, he put macro second and mezzo last.
+This is because even if perfect mezzo allows you to hear enemy comms or see enemy boost,
+doesn't change the fact that all information in Rocket League is able to be known at all
+times.
+And for how fast paced the game is at the highest level, listening to a perfect coach
+verbatim would be better over hearing enemy comms or seeing enemy boost.
+Also, the closest thing to perfect micro in Rocket League is the AI bots.
+I came across footage of three semi-pro players versing three of the best Rocket League AI.
+And the three AI bots were able to win comfortably.
+So here's what this framework actually gives you.
+It helps classify games, but it also helps understand yourself as a player.
+I noticed something when I looked at which games I genuinely enjoy.
+I gravitate toward games in the middle, the full micro-mezzo-macro cluster, and toward
+pure micro and pure macro, but I don't really enjoy micro-macro games.
+Speedrunning doesn't scratch the right itch for me.
+And when I looked at why, it mapped exactly.
+In Apex, I'd argue I aim pretty well and have respectable movement.
+I'd say I also have a solid understanding of rotations and ring positioning, but I tend
+to tunnel vision in close quarter fights, specifically when we're in the same building.
+So I tend to miss mezzo-reads when the pressure is high.
+And this exactly explains the gap in my game.
+Because here's the real insight.
+Every player has a natural lean.
+Some people are micro-players, they grind mechanics obsessively, and they want the skill
+gap to feel fair.
+Some people are mezzo-players, they love reading people, and they thrive in the chaos of PvP
+randomness.
+We even see a common cluster of people who play Among Us, GTA Artee, luck-based games
+like gambling, along with many other party games.
+And then we also see that some players are macro-players, they love efficiency, they
+draw routes on maps, they think about the game between games more than during it.
+And most of us are a mix, but not an equal mix.
+The games that frustrate you the most, they're probably demanding something your brain doesn't
+naturally give.
+The games you keep coming back to, they're probably rewarding the part of you that already
+runs at full power.
+Genre labels never told you any of this.
+Action RPG doesn't tell you whether you'll be grinding execution, reading opponents,
+or solving systems.
+It just tells you there's a sword and a level bar.
+And maybe more importantly, you can stop blaming yourself when a game doesn't click.
+Because maybe the games are testing things you haven't built yet.
+In my case it's the underdevelopment of mezzo.
+And that's the three dimensions of games, micro, mezzo, macro.
+Every game lives somewhere inside them.
+And now that you know where to look, you'll never see a game the same way again.