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Blind Streamer Has Been Playing CS:GO For Years – Tells Why It Works
Streamer Adam “Loop” Bahriz is legally blind due to a disability. However, that doesn’t stop him from playing his favorite shooter, GS:GO, better than most.
Who is this? Streamer Loop has been playing and streaming CS:GO on his channel for several years, despite being at a disadvantage compared to other players.
Loop was born with an extremely rare hereditary disease called hereditary sensory and autonomic neuropathy, HSAN for short (via Ruhr-Universität Bochum), which, among other things, prevents the correct formation of the nerve cell receptors.
Because of this, Loop cannot feel pain and is legally blind. Despite his disability, he is a big fan of the shooter Counter Strike: Global Offensive, which he plays at a high level and has participated in several championships in the past.
– Based on a standard for visual acuity of 1.0 (100%), someone who, despite glasses or contact lenses being corrected, achieves a maximum of 0.30 but more than 0.05 in the better eye is considered to be visually impaired.
– If the visual acuity in the better eye is between 0.05 and 0.02, one speaks of a severe visual impairment.
– With a visual acuity below 0.02, which practically only allows light/dark perception, or if the field of vision is less than 5 degrees, one is considered blind in the sense of the law (via the Federal Association of Ophthalmologists)
“My cousins played it at school”
Loop says: In a conversation with the e-sports YouTuber Jake Lucky, he explained why he loves and plays the fast shooter so much. He was introduced to CS:GO through his cousins who played it at school.
He didn’t expect to be able to play such a game himself, but he was pleasantly surprised:
[…] Something about it [CS:GO] makes it very easy to get into the game. I’ll give you an example: when I tried to play Call of Duty as a kid, there was always a lot of action, corners, camping spots. The user interface is very complex. […] In Counter-Strike […] the environment is very simple. It’s very easy to spot people, especially compared to other games. It’s a very beginner-friendly game, in my opinion.
Apart from setting the sound to the highest level while playing to be able to hear his surroundings, the streamer does not use any other aids when playing. He has no special equipment such as special mice or keyboards for people with disabilities.
According to Loop, to compensate for his visual disadvantage, he developed very fast reflexes. He also sits really close to the screen to see what’s happening right there (via YouTube).
Loop plays CS:GO through ESEA (E-Sports Entertainment Association League), an online platform for semi-professional and professional gamers. There he was even able to achieve the high rank A+, even if he is now back at A. A+ is the third highest rank in the league after S and G.
The near future will initially bring even more CS:GO for Loop. So he announced on his Twitter that he had ordered a new expensive PC from which he hoped more FPS and better performance.
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Blind Gamer tells us how she plays Final Fantasy XIV
