Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?)
2017-04-30
Thread
AudioGames . net Forum — General Game Discussion : frastlin via Audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?) Focus mode is when you pass all your keystrokes to the browser. It's edit or focus mode. For NVDA it is NVDA+space, for jaws it is insert z and I don't know what it is for the other screen readers.You click on the pie or bar button and the app silently opens and when you enter focus mode, it would be exactly as if you opened a .exe file on windows.UI is different than the game itself. I am just talking about UI here. A list like this can help developers focus more on the game play and content rather than what key should announce health. In reality, key strokes should be remapable. The other conventions allow developers to focus on how to implement their idea. A list like this also highlights the deficiencies in current practices, like what is happening here. URL: http://forum.audiogames.net/viewtopic.php?pid=309150#p309150 ___ Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?)
2017-04-30
Thread
AudioGames . net Forum — General Game Discussion : frastlin via Audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?) Focus mode is when you pass all your keystrokes to the browser. It's edit or focus mode. For NVDA it is NVDA+space, for jaws it is insert z and I don't know what it is for the other screen readers.You click on the button and the app silently opens and when you enter focus mode, it would be exactly as if you opened a .exe file on windows.UI is different than the game itself. I am just talking about UI here. A list like this can help developers focus more on the game play and content rather than what key should announce health. In reality, key strokes should be remapable. The other conventions allow developers to focus on how to implement their idea. A list like this also highlights the deficiencies in current practices, like what is happening here. URL: http://forum.audiogames.net/viewtopic.php?pid=309150#p309150 ___ Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?)
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?) @Frastlin, I looked at your audio graphs but I'm afraid I couldn't get any idea. I found two buttons saying "pie graph 1" and "bar graph 1" and a message saying "please enter focus mode if using a screen reader to hear examples" There were no mode switching buttons on the page I could find andAs far as I know Nvda doesn't have a focus mode, even in Supernova which used to call the virtual curser the "virtual focus" it's now called the dolphin curser so I'm afraid I don't know what your getting at though I'd be interested to see what representation your actually trying to achieve particularly with what you say about audio conventions, since I would've thought that for a project like this it would be more a of suggesting the groundwork for representing information coherently in an audio setting than the less critical matter of what control schemes or specific design models of gameplay were u sed in previous games, eg it'd be important to understand how to represent using sound, but it wouldn't matter too much that say most space invaders audio games have not bothered with enemies who actually attack and have tended to use a smaller number of invaders on a more random movement pattern across sterrio field to increase difficulty, as opposed to having a large number of invaders moving slowlybut attacking frequently as is the tradition in mainstream games.As to the more general comments on game inovation, well I agree to an extent, however before everyone gets too much into the doom and gloom I will note that comparing the situation now to the situation ten years ago there is a huge! improvement in what is around and the sort of work being done, both within the community and from interested developers on platforms like Ios.hell, look at the difference between something like Crazy party and the arcade games produced five years ago .Or consider that ten years ago we had no flight sims at all, now we have several, one of which even uses real world gps maps!Yes, we do need things pushing further, and I still! want that audio Final fantasy game, but I'll say that it seems a lot closer now than it has been in the past, another reason why I am afraid I am against the sort of conventions for control or game design mentioned earlier and would rather concentrate upon the important lessons of design. URL: http://forum.audiogames.net/viewtopic.php?pid=309137#p309137 ___ Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?)
2017-04-30
Thread
AudioGames . net Forum — General Game Discussion : zakc93 via Audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?) Also, the mentioned conventions only apply to certain genres of games, specifically fps and side scrollers. What about for example strategy games such as SoundRTS and tactical battle? URL: http://forum.audiogames.net/viewtopic.php?pid=309136#p309136 ___ Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?)
2017-04-30
Thread
AudioGames . net Forum — General Game Discussion : Dragomier via Audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?) This is something I've noticed a lot, A LOT in audiogames. Now, this can't really be an audiogame thing specifically, but what I've noticed is that, of late, story games are far less common and far less substantial. It's all about kill or be killed at a million miles an hour, and not like an RPG, where you can spend time on upgrades, buying things, etc. I think games that do that the best are the games by Aaron Baker, especially Paladin of The Sky and Manamon. I think his games introduce conventions that SHOULD be in the audiogames community, namely the well-developed stories and puzzles, customization and replayability. Again, I know this is not done by just one person, but we are becoming increasingly narrow-minded in this community, I think. We are so concerned with playing mainstream games now, which I do not object to in any way, that the games we can't play remain unplayable to us and people don't take initiative to make one for the blind simila r to it. And now, I can see where you'd say, URL: http://forum.audiogames.net/viewtopic.php?pid=309125#p309125 ___ Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?)
2017-04-29
Thread
AudioGames . net Forum — General Game Discussion : frastlin via Audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?) Hello,I see what you mean as this list being taken as a “end-all” or standard audio game design guide. I don’t want that to happen at all. I see it as being a tool in the ideation process, giving developers, who know nothing about the audiogame community, some idea of what other games have done and what we can expect when we are given an app. The group I am with has nothing to do with games, we are trying to present graphs in an auditory format.Let’s see if I’m barking up the right tree here.Please take a look atMy first initial prototype for a pie graph and a bar graphWhat do you think? URL: http://forum.audiogames.net/viewtopic.php?pid=309089#p309089 ___ Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?)
2017-04-29
Thread
AudioGames . net Forum — General Game Discussion : assault_freak via Audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?) Not quite the same, imho, but that's interpretation, of course. It is natural to study what is done by others, yes, but that doesn't mean you need to start using their design as a base model. That having been said, I think your list is very, very general.. and it communicates a very different message than what I think you are trying to create. Your first post reads:I have been asked by a group of developers to come up with a list of conventions we have in audio games. This list will help both sighted developers create applications for blind users and create a "what is normally done in audio games" document for Audio Games. It was asked for when my first thought to solve a problem was using special audio. Apparently that is not something most developers jump to when trying to create auditory based applications. This list will help bring to light assumptions Audio Gamers have when presented with an application. It is not an audio games developer guide, but it is a list of thoughts that go through a player's mind when they open an audio game for the first time.I would say most of these are not thoughts that go through a user's mind when they open an audio game for the first time, rather they're a list of control schemes and design ideas held by some games, not by all, and the whole list reads in a way that suggests developers should take note of these conventions, when they don't really matter in the scheme of things. 3d games don't have to use the left mouse button to move, or arrows. They can use whatever the developer would like them to use.One needs to center monsters in headphones and shoot themSounds from behind are muffled or lower in volume or pitchThis describes the first person shooter genre, and that is the problem with putting this as a convention... this will lead many to assume that is what has to happen in every shooter, which is why shooters in the audiogames market h ave become stale, because that is all you do. Center, shoot, center, shoot, center, shoot, center... etc etc etc. That is why even multiplayer shooters like RTR aren't enjoyable, because it boils down to who can center and shoot the fastest, which often boils down to luck. The definition of 2d and 3d games is also inaccurate, as is the assumption that all levels in 2d games have to start going right.I'm not trying to criticize, just that there are better ways to create a how to document for creating accessible games. Game developers know how to make games, we don't need to tell them how to make them... because in the end, all an audiogame is is a game with no graphics. The only thing developers have to do to make good audiogames is ad auditory cues to relay normally visual information. the rest is the same as making any game. URL: http://forum.audiogames.net/viewtopic.php?pid=309062#p309062 ___ Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?)
2017-04-29
Thread
AudioGames . net Forum — General Game Discussion : assault_freak via Audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?) Not quite the same, imho, but that's interpretation, of course. It is natural to study what is done by others, yes, but that doesn't mean you need to start using their design as a base model. That having been said, I think your list is very, very general.. and it communicates a very different message than what I think you are trying to create. Your first post reads:I have been asked by a group of developers to come up with a list of conventions we have in audio games. This list will help both sighted developers create applications for blind users and create a "what is normally done in audio games" document for Audio Games. It was asked for when my first thought to solve a problem was using special audio. Apparently that is not something most developers jump to when trying to create auditory based applications. This list will help bring to light assumptions Audio Gamers have when presented with an application. It is not an audio games developer guide, but it is a list of thoughts that go through a player's mind when they open an audio game for the first time.I would say most of these are not thoughts that go through a user's mind when they open an audio game for the first time, rather they're a list of control schemes and design ideas held by some games, not by all, and the whole list reads in a way that suggests developers should take note of these conventions, when they don't really matter in the scheme of things. 3d games don't have to use the left mouse button to move, or arrows. They can use whatever the developer would like them to use.One needs to center monsters in headphones and shoot themSounds from behind are muffled or lower in volume or pitchThis describes the first person shooter genre, and that is the problem with putting this as a convention... this will lead many to assume that is what has to happen in every shooter, which is why shooters in the audiogames market h ave become stale, because that is all you do. Center, shoot, center, shoot, center, shoot, center... etc etc etc. That is why even multiplayer shooters like RTR aren't enjoyable, because it boils down to who can center and shoot the fastest, which often boils down to luck.I'm not trying to criticize, just that there are better ways to create a how to document for creating accessible games. Game developers know how to make games, we don't need to tell them how to make them... because in the end, all an audiogame is is a game with no graphics. The only thing developers have to do to make good audiogames is ad auditory cues to relay normally visual information. the rest is the same as making any game. URL: http://forum.audiogames.net/viewtopic.php?pid=309062#p309062 ___ Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?)
2017-04-29
Thread
AudioGames . net Forum — General Game Discussion : frastlin via Audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?) This is great, keep the ideas coming! This is exactly why we have a list like this. You are all experts and most everyone is saying "I don't like what is being done" This is what leads to inovation. Without this list, what is being done is not as clear.Experts break the rules of what has been done before, newbies have a condensed overview of what is common knowledge when an audiogamer plays a game. It is just like music theory. Composers aren't thinking of theory when they compose, they are thinking about what will make the music sound good. But lots of composers have studied what other composers have done and they have studied music theory. URL: http://forum.audiogames.net/viewtopic.php?pid=309037#p309037 ___ Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?)
2017-04-29
Thread
AudioGames . net Forum — General Game Discussion : assault_freak via Audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?) To my thinking, that is exactly the problem. Since the inception of audio games, particularly action ones, developers have relied on the same designs and conventions from the very beginning. How many side scrolling actions games have left and right for movement, jumping with the up arrow, space bar for the weapons, number row for inventory and h for health? The answer is pretty much all of them... whereas even the beat em ups from the 80s had slightly varying mechanics and controls, so none of them played exactly alike.Area-based menus, as Kai said, are not designed to have things done quickly and have it be that. They are designed that way to help introduce the player to the game world, as well as to possibly aquaint you with npcs in the game. Shadow Rine has implemented this idea in the merchant system where you have to actually locate someone in the game world to enter a shop menu, whereas other games, in a less fun approach in my opinion, have a shop menu you can access from any time, anywhere. While it is convenient, it certainly doesn't teach me much about the world or immerse me in it. Personally, I think if there is a how to document written for potential indie developers, it should focus more on relaying audio information and making information available to the player, while still having enough freedom for the developers to do what they want in the area of base game design and controls. For example, if a developer is considering making a final fight type game, aka a 2d beat em up, I don't want it to be another move left and right, hammer space as much as possible, press the number 2 to cycle to a different weapon, hammer space, then jump a pit, rince and repeat. And the one key thing I would stres is ramping up the difficulty does not mean piling on more health for enemies or damage dealt by such, but more complexity in how enemies behave, or an increase in reaction speed from the player's part being required to fi nish something. URL: http://forum.audiogames.net/viewtopic.php?pid=309029#p309029 ___ Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?)
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?) @roelvdwal: I'm not seeking to replace any establishede conventions for menu designs, nor am I arguing that an interactive menu area is going to be designed with efficiency in mind. My idea for an area-based menu setup is purely for uniqueness, with a good degree of immersion and atmosphere in mind. If the menu looks like the game and behaves like the game, then players are automatically introduced to the world. Mentioning the menu wasn't the point of my argument, however, it was just a supporting reason why we shouldn't expect developers to constrain themselves to a staid design.Kai URL: http://forum.audiogames.net/viewtopic.php?pid=309023#p309023 ___ Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?)
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?) [ a-t ]@roelvdwal I wasn't so much of conventions that would be features as simply of ways of doing things that might be idiosyncratic to the game. For example, in captain dynamite and the fallen hero you perform the actions such as punch block and jump using the x c and z keys. in the context of rhythm action games these are pretty cool controls, all next to each other (actually I felt rather as if I were using a joypad while using those). If however a developer is told "audiogames usually use control and space" we would have lost that. Does it matter in the scheme of things? Well not realy, but the controls did make the game feel different to others. Similarly, look at how spacebar is used in castaways to turn off the clock rather than to select things, and how castaways uses instant letter shortcuts as an alternative to the menu with curser keys to get to your different types of people.Heck, if you want to see a game w ith about the least standard controls you could find, look at tube sim. There are far more important things developers do! need to put into potential audiogame design around the audio interface itself, lessons that have! been learned from games of the past and would make major problems if they are missed, indeed frequently people complain if they are. Consider how often a new developer comes up with a game and misses something like clearly indicating in audio the position of an enemy or other object, actually it seems one of the main mistakes made by some new developers is to assume that difficulty equats to simply by increasing the confusion of the soundscape, eg by throwing as much at the player as possible rather than giving the more difficult problems of judgement and learning. After all it's much better to have a game which is hard but where you know exactly how and why you died, than one where you die just because you can't hear what
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?)
2017-04-29
Thread
AudioGames . net Forum — General Game Discussion : roelvdwal via Audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?) Keep in mind that these are conventions, or if I understand it correctly, a summing up of things how they are done now. These aren't guiding principles, they are baselines, so people don't reinvent what's already been done.And the idea of a menu area sounds interesting, but what will it improve? menus with first-letter navigation work fine, why should they be replaced?The only benefit I see to it is that they will add more atmosphere, but you would either have to put many things very close together or you'd spend a longer time walking there, which is fun for the first few times, until you just want to get it done and it gets annoying. URL: http://forum.audiogames.net/viewtopic.php?pid=309000#p309000 ___ Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?)
2017-04-29
Thread
AudioGames . net Forum — General Game Discussion : assault_freak via Audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?) Well put, dark. Thanks for eloquently restating what I didn't do as eloquently! hahaha. These so-called norms on the list are things that, if all developers followed, we would end up seeing more of the same than if they went with their own ideas while consulting those people who are experienced gamers, preferably both with audio and video games. URL: http://forum.audiogames.net/viewtopic.php?pid=308998#p308998 ___ Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?)
Re: Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?) I'd agree with Assault freak and Kay here, that conventions such as menus using arrows, changing weapons with number row, footstep sounds etc are pretty much extras and not something we'd want to constrain developers into using, after all if everyone had followed the "always use arrows" rule we'd have never had swamp. Likewise, there is a lot to be said for choice here. I myself don't find the cane style sonar (like the one you get with the arrows in swamp), half as useful as coordinates and sound beacons for what I'm looking for, but I'd never suggest removing it from games since manifestly some people find it helpful. Likewise, I'd not want to use 600 wpm on most voices, I'd prefer to put the rate to where it is comfortable, especially if using a human sounding voice. Similarly, though I now do use Nvda with various programs, I don't personally mind using sapi, and these days ms sapi isn't the dire option it used to be, meaning that screen reader support is imho an optional extra, a nice extra to be sure, by no means as essential as it used to be in the Microsoft sam days.I do agree though that there are a few things developers should know, but those are more general principles of how to represent information in sound than specific gaming conventions that should always be followed.For example: Sound provides less of a wider field of overview than vision so there need to be extras to gain a larger pickture of the world, eg, audio beacons, scanning of large area, sonar, coordinates system etc.If the gameplay is dependent upon judgement of position, eg, fast combat or avoiding static obstacles, There should be a way of hearing objects and apprehending their location and behaviour before encountering them. The more spacially complex the environment, the more sounds for none fatal obstacles should be available as reference points, eg, wall sounds, ambie nt water, echoes of footsteps etc.If a synthetic voice is used, the voice'sshould be customizable to suit a player's tastes, this includesspeed of the voice or tone, changing the amount of information spoken, and ability to stop the voice speaking the current sentence or text block and move on to the next. URL: http://forum.audiogames.net/viewtopic.php?pid=308989#p308989 ___ Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?)
2017-04-28
Thread
AudioGames . net Forum — General Game Discussion : frastlin via Audiogames-reflector
Audio Game Conventions (what do lots of audio games do?) Hello,I have been asked by a group of developers to come up with a list of conventions we have in audio games. This list will help both sighted developers create applications for blind users and create a "what is normally done in audio games" document for Audio Games. It was asked for when my first thought to solve a problem was using special audio. Apparently that is not something most developers jump to when trying to create auditory based applications. This list will help bring to light assumptions Audio Gamers have when presented with an application.Please make comments on the items I have here and suggest items I should add.General ConventionsArrow keys are used to move through menusAudio Games are played using headphonesSpeech (if mechanical) can have its speed increased to around 600 WPMAll menus and text are read by either a mechanical voice, the user’s screen reader or a humanMost blind gamers prefer that their screen reader read out text rather than another voiceEscape exits out of screens and menusCapslock is a key that should not be repurposedEnter activates items and elementsSpace fires a weapon, makes the character jump or does something importantEnter skips intros or long cut scenesCtrl shuts up the screen reader or voiceCharacters make the sound of footsteps when they walkFootsteps change or a warning sounds when one is about to hit a wallThere is a sound for hitting a wall or itemHitting walls and items is normal and is how one gets to know the spaceMusic has a volume feature and an off feature or buttonThe number row is used to change items in one’s inventory3D Games3D games are games that have the player move around a space and hear items and creatures in 360 degrees around the headFootsteps change sound as the ground changesCharacters all have footsteps and make soundsHolding down the left mouse button while moving the mouse is how one moves. Movement could also be up arrow for forward and left and right arrow to turnMovement could also be wasd where w is forward and s is backOne needs to center monsters in headphones and shoot themSounds from behind are muffled or lower in volume or pitchThere is an unobtrusive radar that can be turned on and off that beeps and changes sound based on what it detects, like a cane2D Games2D games are games that are played on a left, right, up down plane. They only use panning and not the muffling for behind sounds.Left and right arrow keys move forward and backUp arrow jumpsDown arrow ducksH is healthSpace fires a weapon or does a significant actionNPCs move by panning left and rightLevels start by going rightObstacles are either something that move left and right or are stationaryAn obstacle that falls has a long sound with a thud or bang at the end and repeatsThings that fall from the sky start higher in pitch and get lower as they falli opens the inventory URL: http://forum.audiogames.net/viewtopic.php?pid=308972#p308972 ___ Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
