Have you ever wondered why some people are better at first-person shooters than others? One important difference might be how people see while playing.
Nikkei recently posted a clip tracking a professional FPS player’s vision while playing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and compared the data to the vision of an amateur player.
Both players wore glasses with infrared sensors and cameras.
Esports pro Leisia of Libalent Vertex, the most successful Japanese Call of Duty team, perceived the map differently than the amateur player.
In the clip, the red dot tracks the player’s sight. When Leisia’s focus became fixed, the red dot became larger.
His line of sight was stable throughout the map, and the location and size of the dot suggested he was aware of the sounds, sights, and necessary information on the map.
One field of vision expert compared this to how pro golfers focus before hitting the ball.
The amateur player’s eyes darted around quickly, never seeming to really focus until he’s killed. There isn’t the pinpoint focus of the pro.
While moving, his focus is even more frantic.
In omparison, when Leisia is on the move, he keeps his focused vision in the center of the screen. Notice how the pro keeps referencing the map to know where he is. According to Leisia, he tries to imagine where enemies will appear.
It’s how they see the game that makes such a huge difference in how they play it.