does studying masters games really help improve skill?

can some strong players tell me if this really is all its said to be or should I still focus on tactics.

When I was around 1300 I tried to play over some GM games because that's advice I often heard, but the games were confusing. Often a GM would seem to give up a pawn for "free" but then the other GM wouldn't take the "free" pawn.

Sometimes notes would explain this, but other times it wouldn't, and so it was frustrating, and I gave up the practice of looking at GM games.

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But now, in hindsight, one thing I wish I had done was play over GM games!

I was going about it the wrong way. You're not supposed to spend 30 minutes, 1 hour, 2 hours (etc) on a game. You're not supposed to try and understand every move. It's enough if you only see 1 move or idea in the entire game that is interesting or new to you. This can be a tactics, but it can also be an opening, endgame, or anything else. For the whole game you only need to spend 5-10 minutes.

It's also useful to pay attention to broad ideas. Which side of the board did white seek play on? (kingside, center, or queenside) Which side did black? How did they do it, with pawns or pieces? Where were the pawn breaks?

Don't just get in the habit of answering these questions, but after the opening moves make some predictions. If a game is truely interesting to you, then you can spend as long as you like... but I wouldn't plan on spending more than 5 or 10 minutes on a game.

And the idea isn't that it'll make you a better player right away. It's a cumulative effect. Look at 1 or 2 games a day, spend less than 30 minutes. After a year you'll have see a few hundred games. If you picked up only 1 new idea or pattern from most of them, then you'll be a lot better for having done so.

Thank you for giving such an informative answer. I bought a book of games from great masters of the 1930-1960 era a little while ago. only went through a few games then I stopped but now I will start again.

"... [annotated games are] infinitely more useful than bare game scores. However, annotated games vary widely in quality. Some are excellent study material. Others are poor. But the most numerous fall into a third category - good-but-wrong-for-you. ... You want games with annotations that answer the questions that baffle you the most. ..." - GM Andrew Soltis (2010)

"... there are major advantages to studying older games rather than those of today. The ideas expressed in a Rubinstein or Capablanca game are generally easier to understand. They are usually carried out to their logical end, often in a memorable way, ... In today's chess, the defense is much better. That may sound good. But it means that the defender's counterplay will muddy the waters and dilute the instructional value of the game. For this reason the games of Rubinstein, Capablanca, Morphy, Siegbert Tarrasch, Harry Pillsbury and Paul Keres are strongly recommended - as well as those of more recent players who have a somewhat classical style, like Fischer, Karpov, Viswanathan Anand and Michael Adams. ..." - GM Andrew Soltis (2010)