What games DON'T require spatial memory? I'm having a hard time thinking of one.

I'm more concerned for people that drive around using a GPS in an actual car and somehow never learn the city layout.

Games depending on such GPS systems tend to be significantly hampered by its removal (which makes sense), and thus such basic removal is rarely a sufficient fix.

The only reason I'd imagine BotW might work fine is that Nintendo has made open(ish) world games before, and as far as I can remember, have never made much use of such systems. More likely than not, the game was designed without markers, and markers added after the fact; which is clearly untrue of most other modern open-world games

I'd like to see more large scale adventure games like this.

It seems to me like games like Portal / Talos Principle / Amnesia would rely on spacial memory more than most games out there. Can anyone confirm or deny if this hypothesis is correct?

It's been a long time since I touched the pro circuit of any game, but in Q3 the best players were the ones who could predict where you were in addition to where they needed to go. Pretty different skill, and it took a ton of very dedicated practice.

I.e. In the COD4 campaign you don't need to know the map, you can just blindly run through the level killing what's in front of you until you hit a progress trigger.

Especially if players don't take time to gain a degree of mastery with the game and move from title to title.

My first questions were: "How was this measured/detected? How might I know whether I used these strategies when I play games?"

The answer from your Nature link is very detailed, too detailed to reproduce here. See the section titled, "4 on 8 virtual maze". IIUC they partitioned the groups into "spatial" vs "response" learners by determining whether they navigated a maze while using a memorized sequence of landmarks or without.

Other games encourage you to plan long term and work within systems.

I think these exercise very different parts of your brain - is it possible there's simply a trade off here?

On the other hand, single player in call of duty is about the most mind numbing thing it's possible to play, there's no competition, it's just kill guys and advance in a straight line. Would be interesting to compare with more competitive or open world games.

I'd argue that spatial and temporal considerations are critical in PUBG. Sure, it's not real-time strategy kind of planning, but understanding your exposure to others based on elevation & movement speed, resource management, blue/white perimeter placement and strategy to get to the objective while avoiding enemy LOS does encourage higher order thinking.