The Hague:
With a joystick in one hand, a Braille device below the other and a mask more than his eyes, BlindWarriorSven effectively disposes of however a further opponent.
“I put this mask on because sometimes people tell me I’m not really blind,” he says with a smile, in reference to the sore losers he has beaten on the video game streaming web-site Twitch.
Sven van de Wege was only six when he was struck by cancer. He lost his sight, but was determined not to let his disability get in the way of his childhood passion for video games.
And it hasn’t: the 35-year-old Dutchman has beaten some of the world’s most effective players at tournaments about Europe, and claimed a champion’s title for playing the iconic “Street Fighter” series.
His hearing is his important weapon. Van de Wege navigates his way about Street Fighter V, a game with “a very detailed sound design”, applying solely its sound effects.
After years of coaching for many hours a day, the volume of his opponent’s footsteps tells him how far away they are the sound of every single punch and blow tells him how to react.
“By those audio cues, I’m able to know if I’m on the left, if I’m on the right, how I need to attack,” he explains.
Streaming With No Screen
It’s a talent he’s now monetising through Twitch, a web site with some 30 million customers per day — most of whom log in to watch other individuals play video games.
Putting collectively a streaming studio adapted to van de Wege’s requires expected specialist gear as effectively as a fair quantity of creativity from the gaming champion, who operates by day as an IT engineer.
The studio, which sits inside his apartment in The Hague, incorporates two computer systems hooked up to a Braille show.
This device translates comments from the stream’s live chat into Braille that he can study by touch, permitting him to interact with the viewers watching him play.
There’s no laptop or computer screen in front of him, just a wall.
“I don’t need a screen, and it saves energy,” he points out.
He finds that “the most difficult thing is keeping an eye on the chat”: the comments, providing encouragement or wisecracks, whizz by and can be tough to comply with even for seeing players who are focused on attempting to crush their rivals in the game.
Van de Wege, who joined Twitch in 2017, challenges subscribers to his channel just about every Sunday in furious combat.
“When I play versus my viewers, I think eight out of 10 matches I win,” he says.
A headset stays glued to his ears, so that he can track his enemies’ just about every move through the side effects.
Accessibility Features Needed
The Street Fighter obsessive sometimes dips into other games, despite the fact that he says also a lot of titles lack the accessibility features necessary for players with disabilities.
Twitch has faced stress to encourage diversity on the platform, specifically because the most effective-paid players on the web-site are overwhelmingly capable-bodied white guys.
In May, the web-site added some 350 tags to let members of diverse communities to uncover every single other more conveniently, such as one for individuals with disabilities.
But van de Wege says Twitch could do more to make the platform accessible for sight-impaired players.
Deciphering the messages in the live chat can be tough for the reason that individuals post pictures, which messes with his Braille device.
“I wish there was an option that you could just have a plain chat without all the graphical stuff,” he says.
Van de Wege at the moment holds affiliate status on Twitch, exactly where the size of his payouts is linked to the quantity of subscribers — he has 3,000 — and the quantity they donate.
He at the moment earns significantly less than one hundred euros a month on the platform but hopes to one day realize companion status, which would let him to stream as a complete-time job.
“If I had thought ‘I’m blind, I cannot play video games anymore’, I would have given up,” he says.
“If I can do it, I’m sure that more people can do it.”
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