Hi Dark: Yes, actually developing games for the blind requires a different set of practices, some extra skills, and some forethought that would not go into standard game programming. Anyone can go pick up a book on programming games in C++, Java, or Python, but all is designed for someone building a standard video game with heavy 2d an 3d graphics and only have audio support as a single chapter almost as an after thought. Usually, the audio mixer being discussed is used for very basic sound and music playback and the book doesn't even discuss anything advanced like 5.1 surround sound or 3d virtualization which would be of vital importance to a blind gamer. No game programming books I know of go into using Sapi for text to speech, voice recognition, etc which is a fairly important component of many accessible games.
The point being before we can even get the mainstream developers, be they independent developers or not, we have to tell them not to use the standard books on game programming as a guide because they are all wrong from the get-go when it comes to access. We need some one to sit down and write how to build a game from the ground up with accessibility included in the design, discuss topics like text to speech output, more advanced audio processing, along with the usual 2d an 3d graphics required for sighted users. There are other considerations that would not occur to a sighted developer such as pausing or stopping the main thread while the game is speaking, because such things are not done in a video game. People see it shoot it, but for us if we are scanning for something we need to stop the action long enough to give the speech enough time to make important announcements that a sighted user can see. Of course, right there is one problem with universal accessibility. If a blind person needs to freeze the game to hear something a sighted gamer can see a sighted gamer is going to get upset pretty quickly if his or her screen suddenly freezes while the speech is blabbing off some status they can see. There is not a good solution for this problem. If the game is not paused during the speech that would give the sighted player an unfair advantage over a blind opponent because he has almost instant feedback, and the blind opponent has to listen to their synth speak everything on screen. Of course, the blind person can react to sound queues which might go a long way to helping resolve this conflict, but it isn't perfect by any means. The main point of my argument is there are different ways of doing things in accessible games, and most sighted developers go about it the wrong way from the second they start writing a game. By the time they find out what they did wrong, are asked to add accessibility, it is either too hard to fix or requires a total rewrite. The only way to resolve this problem is to get the current writers of the various game programming books to discuss these things in their books and to not minimize the fact that it must be considered in advance before they start their compilers. Cheers! On 12/10/13, dark <[email protected]> wrote: > Hi. > > I thought we'd already been through this. Tom is exactly right, particularly > > since a lot goes into motion impared gaming. > > I'd also like to point out that for certainly at least some groups > mainstream games are less inaccessible. > > The principle reason doom 3 got the close captioning project was because it > > was a game that relied heavily on it's sound kews as per it's horror > atmosphere, this made it inaccessible to deaf gamers. The first two doom > games however were quite accessible without sound for all that a deaf gamer > > would need to react more quickly and pay more attention to visual kews, > indeed there are many sighted gamers who played so called "video games" with > > the sound off. > > of course, this isn't to say that deaf gamers have everything easy, however > > how many sighted gamers would play games with the graphics turned off? > > As another example, what proportion of mainstream games are playable with a > > mouse alone? Lots of motion impared gamers just get to use a mouse through > head or motion tracking, and while naturally that causes problems, at the > same time there are some games where it'd make no difference at all such as > > point and click adventures, or mosue based action rpgs such as runeskape. > > Again, this isn't to belittle the point of motion impared gamers, just to > point out the inequity. > > The very term "Video games" which most people use of computer games is > specifically inaccessible to visually impared gamers, indeed I suspect this > > is part of the reason why, while sites like retroremakes and penny arcade > have major sections and information on other disabilities there is literally > > nothing on visual imparements at all other than some very occasional > comments about colour blindness. > > So, while I certainly agree access for all would be a great thing, i > actually wonder if there is a much larger gap to fill to even make vi gamers > > on an equal footing with other disabled groups at least in the perception of > > developers both independent and mainstream. > > Beware the grue! > > dArk. > > > --- > Gamers mailing list __ [email protected] > If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to > [email protected]. > You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at > http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. > All messages are archived and can be searched and read at > http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]. > If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, > please send E-mail to [email protected]. > --- Gamers mailing list __ [email protected] If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to [email protected]. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to [email protected].
