Query of top players of the month

Question

In a web game there is a ranking of the top points games played of the month:

// QUERY
SELECT * FROM game
WHERE date >= date_sub(CURDATE(),INTERVAL 1 MONTH)
ORDER BY points DESC limit 0, 20

But, in that case one player can be the top 1,2,3... so I have changed the query to add a distinct, and then only appears one game for player (the game with max points):

// Query that filters player names
SELECT g.*
FROM game g
INNER JOIN ( SELECT playerName, MAX(points) AS MaxPoints
             FROM game
             GROUP BY playerName
           ) groupGame
        ON g.playerName = groupGame.playerName AND g.points = groupGame.MaxPoints 
WHERE date >= date_sub(CURDATE(),INTERVAL 1 MONTH)
ORDER BY points DESC limit 0, 20

The query works OK but the second query is much slower than the first. Is there any way to optimize it?

Answer 1

You will have to test performance, but a GROUP BY should help:

SELECT playerName, MAX(points) AS points /*[, other columns]*/
FROM game
WHERE date >= date_sub(CURDATE(),INTERVAL 1 MONTH)
GROUP BY playerName /*[, other columns]*/
ORDER BY points DESC
LIMIT 0, 20