I’m standing in a field with tall grass swaying in the light breeze. In the distance, trees obscure the sunlight as it streams through between the leaves. Nearby, a small cottage leaves a plume of ashy smoke drifting towards the sky, as puffy white clouds lazily crawl across the horizon. The game I’m playing is Skyrim, a game that while visually impressive, has been constantly modified and tweaked by the community to look as lifelike as possible. And to the average gamer, the game does look absolutely breathtaking from almost every angle.

For Robert Kingett, a 24 year old gamer in Chicago, things are a little bit different. The grass may look like a fuzzy green carpet. The trees look like tall dark sticks, and the clouds are barely visible against a mixed backdrop of blue and white. But despite facing difficulties with his sight and having cerebral palsy, Robert does what most other twenty-something young men do – he plays videogames. His disabilities haven’t stopped him from playing and reviewing games, which is something he does a passion that can be found in only a handful of gamers. Over a flurry of emails back and forth, I quizzed him about how he plays videogames, what his pet peeves are when gaming, and how he remains so infectiously optimistic. Here’s what he had to say:

What was the first game you played that unlocked your passion for video games?

It was Jeopardy for DOS back when I was five years old. I actually got it for my birthday but the questions were really hard for me to see, so my grandfather sat down with me every time I wanted to play. He didn't discourage me wanting to do something because he thought I would become addicted. Despite his lack of technical knowledge, he wanted to give me opportunities so he helped me figure out that game and adaptations to help me play when he wasn't around. That definitely made an impact. Before he died, he proved that where there was a will there was a way and I carry on that notion because it's true.

What are your favorite genres to play? Are you attracted to these genres because they are more accessible to you? (E.g playing a side-scrolling game versus an FPS)

I actually do have my favorite genres that I gravitate to because they hold promise for being accessible majority of the time, and that's RPG’s and Tower Defense games. I will try any game that I can get my hands on even though I enjoy games like action RPG’s, Action Adventure games, side scrollers, and games in those niches but I don't limit myself by any means. There are definitely genres I like but not always accessible, such as survival Horror, Puzzles, Card games with a fantasy element like Yu Gi Oh, Magic, or first person shooters, but I'm the kind of gamer who will play video games in general because it's fun!

Is gaming on a PC more accessible than a console? I would imagine on a PC you can change things like contrast or have text to speech running to help you out versus on a console?

Visually impaired people use two types of adaptive technology on a computer - screen readers and screen magnifiers. They both interact with the computer in very different ways and this has different outcomes with different programs and different websites. Screen magnifiers are easy to work with because all they do is, essentially, magnify the screen. A screen reader operates differently. On a web page, Screen reader users hear the title of the web page (assuming there is one), then each text element in the order that it appears in the document. If it's not coded in a way where the screen reader can, literally, read what's on the screen then someone who uses screen readers, like me, can't use that particular program.

Steam is completely inaccessible because my screen reader doesn't read anything after steam loads up, and, ironically it's a platform a lot of PR people want to give me review codes for. I also use high contrast, white text on black, and the display doesn't show Steam in easy to read high contrast so, after a while, I have a huge headache and I don’t want to stay logged in anymore. It's also very hard for me to actually download demos because the text is so small on Steam and big on everything else on my Windows laptop. Steam doesn't have accessibility options, so I'm stuck.

I do understand why some disabled people like gaming on a computer because of the vast control mapping options but I find a controller is just a bit more precise. For me there's more fluid movement when I am playing on my PS4 then with a keyboard and mouse on a computer. Also, with computer games, I always have a compatibility issue in terms of graphics and such - I have to lower the graphics setting to make the game stop stuttering but I don't have to do that with consoles. I can just play and not tweak things to make a game run smoothly, and I like that better overall.

Have your disabilities made it harder for you to communicate with other gamers online? How have people reacted when you join a multiplayer game? Or do you prefer single-player games instead?

In multiplayer games I will always be at a slight disadvantage because I can't look at multiple parts of the screen at once because of my tunnel vision. It's like looking through a toilet paper roll all the time. My cerebral palsy hinders me as well but not in games like MAGIC, or similar because that's strategy. I do have a stutter and people who want to be gamers are quick to point out I sound “retarded” or “like I am disabled.” It saddens me to see that there are not many true gamers anymore who just enjoy gaming no matter how unskilled someone is. I actually know some mentally disabled people who play better than most, and when I say play, I mean their spirit.

I've experienced a lot of that, and I just don't understand why people say some of the things that they say. It's not going to create an elite gaming world full of epic gamers who know every Easter egg known to man. Gamers will game, no matter who says what. I'm a gaymer and I will game on. I enjoy the art and everything else video games have to offer and that means enjoying it with all kinds of people. There are even cases of people being flat out derogatory to other races on video games. Again, I don't understand why. I don’t want people like that ruining it for us gamers.

What do you think is the general perception in the gaming community of gamers who are disabled?

I think the general perception is that people with disabilities will never be really good at any video game. Naturally, as with everything, practice makes perfect, but there are people who believe that we shouldn’t even be included into the debates, magazines, or anything because video games weren't designed to be accessible to the visually impaired. They should be - it's entertainment value for all of us.

What is your motivation for playing through and reviewing games? Would you like that to be a full-time job one day or just continue as a hobby?

The motivation came from reading a review in Electronic Gaming Monthly. It was a review of Splinter Cell Blacklist. I was very happy to even be able to read an edition of a gaming magazine because it is the only one recorded by the National Library Service, for the blind and the visually impaired. I was unable to read a gaming magazine before so I loved the chance to lie in bed and listen to the magazine, but out of all the reviews I listened to none of them really addressed my particular questions. Would the game have an easy to see HUD? Would the game have an easy to see Minimap? Would the game have closed captions so my deaf friend could help me? Would the game have control customization options where I could toggle stuff instead of holding down buttons? None of the writers mentioned those kinds of things at all so I began a vast search for disabled reviews in mainstream media. There were a lot of reviews on able gamers but I wanted to see someone at a mainstream review site talk about these issues. I didn't find anything, in ANY mainstream site so I thought that, hey, I can write, and game, and since no one else is bringing this to the mainstream, I want to. I was actually amazed that other disabled gamers didn't approach magazines like Electronic Gaming Monthly and review games on an accessibility basis.

I'm a writer beyond anything so I hope, one day, I get to write full time by providing opinions, reviews, insights, or news. It would be wicked if I COULD write video game reviews full time. If it happens, I definitely won’t complain. At the moment, I will continue to work very hard and remain diligently passionate about anything that I do, because I have a lot of passions and I believe that combining them with my writing will make something happen. I just have to work hard.