IGDA Game Accessibility Special Interest Group

Attractor




Attractors is a simple puzzle game developed by The Game Kitchen with AccessAble Games as accessibility advisor. The game have special accessibility options like: no time limit, no death, possibility to restart a level at any time, change game speed, one switch mode, microphone control mode, high contrast and no-click mode. 

You can play it for free at: www.thegamekitchen.com/attractor

Also, you can download it and place on our own web site. Take it from here: www.thegamekitchen.com/attractor/attractor-redis01.zip

While playing, press ESC to return to main menu; you will return to the level that you have left when you click play again on main menu. Main menu and between levels menu are also accessible for one switch and no-click mode.

Attractor's option screen: 

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BlindComputerGames.com



Head shot of a young woman wearing headphones, and large wrap-a-round glasses with colourful Atari VCS style graphics in the lenses. From one of Atari's 1976 Video Music magazine adverts.

"blindcomputergames.com is an information resource that includes:

A set of guidelines for developers who want to improve blind accessibility in their games.

An article for gamers who are blind to help them show developers how to make their games accessible to them.

Articles that give developers technical information, including code samples, to help them make their games accessible.

For gamers, it gives the technical words they need to communicate with developers at companies, big and small. It explains who to talk to, what information the developer will need, and when in the development cycle to communicate with a developer and to have the best chance of obtaining the changes that will increase accessibility.

For developers, it explains screen readers and self-voicing, and includes a blind accessibility checklist, some good example games, technical “how to's”, and a short guide to blind etiquette.

It's totally free and requires no registration.

The project took three months and was done at the request of and with the help of Dark, the administrator for audiogames.net and the leading advocate for blind gamers.

He is frequently asked by developers, "What would it take?" Now he has a place to send them, and a place to send his readers who have a game or other software program that they can “almost use”.

Although it is focused on games, much of the information is applicable to any software, not just games.

Any feedback would be helpful."

Via: Eleanor Robinson - 7-128 Software on the IGDA GASIG mailing list.

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Game Accessibility Campaigner: Gareth Garratt



Gareth and Mum, Jacqueline Garratt, in front of his game controller, a Toshiba Mouse on raised box to bring it to a comfortable chin level.


Gareth Garratt has achieved something fantastic. He's one of a growing number of disabled gamers who have petitioned for greater access in a game, and then been promised it by the developer.

Facing the familiar problem of being unable to reconfigure the game controls on his latest purchase, EA's Dead Space 2, he posted his frustrations on the  OverClockers Forums.

This in turn led to people spreading his message further, a huge boost to Chuck Bittner's Custom Remapping Petition, and eventually straight to the developers of Dead Space 2 themselves. They ended up posting the following:

"Hi Gareth, I'm a developer from Visceral Games Australia, the studio responsible for the PC port of Dead Space 2. Sorry to hear about your issue - I've spoken with a few key people here and we'll do our best to include a fix for it in the next patch. In the mean time, please PM me. Cheers! Michael."

Then, in a message to Joystiq, Dead Space 2 executive producer Steve Papoutsis went one further.

"The Dead Space 2 team is aware of the issue that disabled players are having with Dead Space 2 PC. In fact a number of folks on our team are so passionate about getting this fix done that they are currently working hard to allow players to re-map key bindings to the mouse which should help disabled players enjoy the game.

"I'd like to say I'm very proud of the people on the Dead Space 2 team for coming in today and jumping on the fix first thing. Working with such a talented and compassionate group of people is incredible and makes me proud to be a part of the Dead Space 2 team, Visceral Games, and Electronic Arts.

"In addition to the key binding fix the patch will include other fixes for PC players. Thank you for taking up the cause for our disabled players and letting us know about this problem. Once the patch is fully tested we will announce a release date."

Let's hope EA will be encouraging all their teams to add reconfigurable control options in the future.

Links to: PC GamerEuroGamer and others - via Gavin Philips, Mick Donegan and Lynsey Graeme on the IGDA GASIG mailing list.

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