2017-05-15 19:41:45

It published a little early unfortunately, wasn't supposed to go up until global accessibility awareness day on Thursday, but that aside wrote a quick post on some of the recent developments:

http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/IanHamil … gamers.php

2017-05-15 19:50:42

You use the term "blind accessible" a lot, which I can't say I'm a fan of, and there are some things I think should be fixed to make that article look a little more polished, personally... but that's a great summary of the landscape as it is now! I love it! Things are changing, for sure... the resources are there, but without developer interest, this will go nowhere... so hopefully more developers will slowly open up to the idea. Killer Instinct, being one of the big hits of this generation, would make a huge landmark if it became fully accessible, as opposed to just playable.

Discord: clemchowder633

2017-05-15 20:17:24

@Assault: this term is actually very important, because for too long there has been stuff for visually impaired, one-switch, magnifiers, etc. But this is focussing, specifically it seems, on the totally blind side of things, something that has been lacking until around last year when Sony and Microsoft finally started adding text to speech support.

2017-05-15 20:20:35 (edited by ianhamilton_ 2017-05-16 01:38:59)

@assault_freak, it was written in a bit of a hurry but isn't being publicised until Thursday, so would love to hear your thoughts on making it more polished!

2017-05-15 20:52:43

This is all well and good, but it's up to developer implementation. Much like any tool, it's optional, and if developers are primarily used to developing for mainstream gamers, i think they would need a pretty strong push to actually make something happen. I think a big company is going to have to lead the way, Microsoft probably, with the xbox one, but even then, i fear that even if one game was made fully accessible, it would be a drop in the ocean, and get say, a mention in the footnotes of an article. Forgive me, but i think this will take some years to really get flushed out, not that i'm not pumped for the landscape to evolve, i can't help but be more practical than optimistic.

2017-05-15 21:27:21 (edited by ianhamilton_ 2017-05-15 21:28:46)

arqmeister yes, absolutely. But having said that, gamasutra is an industry website, the goal of the article is to help raise awareness amongst developers smile

there have been plenty of developers over recent years in particular who have wanted to implement accessibility for blind gamers but haven't been able to as there haven't been any tools available, I'm personally confident that we'll now start to see a few at least.

2017-05-15 21:58:08

Hi.
This is a really great article. I hope this will change things in the future. It's very well written in my opinion.

Best regards SLJ.
Feel free to contact me privately if you have something in mind. If you do so, then please send me a mail instead of using the private message on the forum, since I don't check those very often.
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2017-05-15 22:46:56

What is 9th duke?

2017-05-15 23:44:42

This was a very well written and informative article. I highly encourage everyone to share this on Twitter and Facebook as I did.

2017-05-16 00:14:19

i THINK YOU'RE MISISING A KEY POINT iAN, IN THAT IT'S UP TO PUBLISHERS AND DEVELOPERS TO USE WHAT'S OUT THERE.

iF ANYTHING, MY CONCERN IS A BIG PUBLISHER OR HARDWARE MAKER WILL BUY UP....SAY....tOLC NOW WITH THE EXPOSURE IT'S GOT THROUGH THE ARTICLE, AND MAKE IT PROPRIETARY AND LICENSE IT ONLY TO ONE SYSTEM, A LA ms VOICES AND FONTS, A LA sONY'S COSED SYSTEMS AND THEIR tts ENGINE.


tHAT BEING SAID i DO THINK YOU NEED TO SPREAD YOUR ARTICLE OUT MORE, TO THE rOCK pAPER sHOTGUNS, THE tOTALbISCUITS AND jIM sTERLINGS, THE eSCAPISTS OF THE WORLD, THE HIGH TRAFFIC SITES. tHAT MAY WELL GET PEOPLE TALKING ABOUT IT AND IF THE GAME PUBLISHERS SEE IT'S OUT IN THE GENERAL CONCIOUSNESS THEY MIGH* CONSIDER IT.

* aSSUMING OF COURSE THEY'RE INTERESTED IN IT TO BEGIN WITH AND NOT ANOTHER GENERIC mANSHOOTER xcvmi fps dudbro TYPE GAME REALLY...i DON'T THINK EVERY DEV WILL BE ON BOARD WITH MAKING THEIR GAMES ACCESSIBLE, AT LEAST INITIALLY, BUT SOMEBODY HAS TO BLINK FIRSTAND TAKE THE PLUNGE, RIGHT? i MEAN, sKULLGIRLS 2 HAS AN ACCSSIBLE MENU. dIVEKICK IS A SIMPLE TWO BUTTON FIGHTING GAME THAT USES SOUNDS FOR MOVES SO YOU CAN EASILY LEARN IT...AND IT'S ENTERTAINING TOO, AND THERE'S INDIE STUFF LIKE tHERE cAME AN eCHO.

bOTH OF THE LAST TWO ARE INDIE GAMES, AND BOTH ARE NOT COOKIE CUTTER MASS MARKET GAMES.

Warning: Grumpy post above
Also on Linux natively

2017-05-16 02:06:41

DracoSelene89 - yes, of course. But they have to know about what is available to use before they can decide whether to use it

2017-05-16 17:00:38

I don't know if a big publisher would by out tolk, particularly as it's developed by a member of this very community, who I haven't seen for a while.

2017-05-16 20:04:58

Dragomier you can use the xbox app to stream gameplay through a PC, just plug in your xbox pad via USB

2017-05-16 20:14:35

Wrong topic? lol

Discord: clemchowder633

2017-05-17 00:09:01

Indeed, how bizarre!

2017-05-18 19:14:34

@DracoSelene89 are you aware that your post was actually written in all caps? lol. That was a little too much yelling for my ears. sad

Anyway, pretty good article. As somebody who's been out of the loop when it comes to console gaming for a long time (in fact, I still am), this seemed to summarize it very well. So, thank you. I'm very excited to see where all this accessibility will take us. I yet have to sit down with any console with text-to-speech capabilities.