Game Accessibility

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The Accessibility of Computer Games



This website is part of the Game Accessibility project, a research project that focuses on the accessibility of electronic games for gamers with disabilities. This website aims to inform disabled gamers about the availability of accessible games, and functions at the same time as an academic resource for developers, publishers and researchers in order to stimulate accessibility in games.

The Game Accessibility project has been made possible by a financial contribution from NSGK (Dutch Foundation for the Disabled Child) and SNS Bank. More information about sponsors and participants.


www.game-accessibility.com/

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Making Games Accessible

It's probably not up there with your most frequent thoughts for the day, but most video games aren't exactly friendly for those with certain disabilities. A 1UP feature on the topic of gamers with disabilities mostly focuses on some stories of people who, whether they be blind, deaf or born with joint disorders can still kick all kinds of @$$ in their chosen title. Which is awesome. But the thing that really stands out in the article is the lack of support most games and hardware feature for disabled customers.

It's standard fare now for TV and DVDs to have features like closed captions, but I wonder how many consoles need to be sold until we see more specialised peripherals, or at least software, for those with disabilities? Currently a lot of this work is done by dedicated third-parties like Games [CC] and AudioGames, but some more first-party attention would be even better, at least on the software side of things.

Incidentally, if the topic interests you, check out Game Accessibility, a site setup as a central web resource for organisations and businesses to campaign and cater for more accessible games. Well worth checking out. Luke Plunkett

Amazing Journeys: Gamers With Disabilities [1UP] www.1up.com/do/feature?cId=3156848


kotaku.com/gaming/game-accessibility/making-games-accessible-233855.php