Gamers and the video game industry don’t have the greatest reputation. Allegations of a sexist culture and links with acts of violence haven’t exactly associated gaming with having a positive influence on American youth. But a new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences could change how we see gaming, especially the action games that many deem, “mindless.”

The study by a collaboration of researchers from universities found that casually playing action video games actually aids the brain’s development because it exercises our ability to build models of the world and react to things that happen to us.

Researchers paid college students to play games like “Call of Duty” and “The Sims,” then compared those who played action-packed games to those who played games with little action. Researchers paid college students money to play the games for an average of a little more than an hour per week. After nine weeks, they found that action game players were quicker at perceptual learning tasks than they were when the experiment started, while the non-action group was slower to improve. A year later, the action game players still performed better.

However, researchers warned that too much game play isn’t good for the brain either because it means less time spent on homework and academics. And while the action aspect of games had a positive influence, researchers said nothing of the content, like the lack of representation of female and Latino characters.