Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
Hi Thomas, Evolution 3D, I knew as soon as I heard the name I'd remember., my guess of genesis couldn't have been much further wrong than evolution lol. although the engine will be for experienced developers it is another project in the audio game community that will ultimately aid these developers and therefore help grow the industry. That would explain why I didn't see the slowdown in the industry , since I probably didn't play my first audio game until about 2007 or 2008 when a lot of the games you talked about had already been released I think though that although it has slowed down, like main stream games audio games will continue with games getting bigger, more in depth, complex and using new ideas and approaches like you said with a focus on quality rather than quantity and I think we'd all say that's a good thing. All that being said though, just like main stream games no matter how much games have changed and technology moves on some of the older games will always be some of the best ones. Paul -Original Message- From: Gamers [mailto:gamers-boun...@audyssey.org] On Behalf Of Thomas Ward Sent: Thursday, August 08, 2013 4:00 AM To: Gamers Discussion list Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers Hi Paul, Well, there is a lot of truth to the fact that the audio games industry is slowing down. As I explained in my prior post most of the audio games out today were developed between 1999 and 2004 which is a remarkably short span of time. On the other hand the games developed after 2004 have more depth and complexity to them such as Entombed, Swamp, Time of Conflict, and so on. So while the development of audio games have slowed down what we have gotten are more in depth products than we saw in that first five years of the industry. The focus now seems to be quality over quantity. As far as developers like the BGT developers being the next big game companies of the future that remains to be seen. Mostly what I've seen in BGT is pretty simplistic stuff, some developers come out with one or two games, and disappear never to be heard from again. So I am skeptical of how much an impact it may or may not have long term. As for my own engine, Evolution 3D, its not designed for amateurs so unless a game developer knows exactly what they are doing they won't be able to use it. I've thought of rewriting it with a BGT type scripting interface, but don't want to take the time or effort on that. Cheers! --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. 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/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
Hi Shawn, Yep your definitely right it's sad to see when developers leave the community , but hopefully that just allows us as a community to appreciate the ones we do have even more. I think the last time I brought a main stream game the top end price was about £39.99, but I've seen new main stream games go for a lot more than that these days. I think we're definitely lucky to have devices like the iPhone being so accessible which has led to an increase in games on platforms like this. The other good thing with the games on IOS is a lot of them all carry only a small price tag to. Although that being said about prices I don't have any issue paying more money for a game if the game is a good game, entombed is one of my favourite games and I know a few people have said it is one of the more expensive audio games. but with the amount of hours fun I got from the game it was worth every penny I spent. I only hope that we haven't lost Jason as a developer and he comes back to make another game. Paul --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. 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/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
Hi James, Definitely, I think it's great to see so many new people like yourself taking an interest in writing games and to see the people that have been developing for years continuing to work hard on new projects and ideas and my hat comes off to each and every one of them all for the hard work they put into this community. Paul -Original Message- From: Gamers [mailto:gamers-boun...@audyssey.org] On Behalf Of James Bartlett Sent: Thursday, August 08, 2013 4:50 AM To: Gamers Discussion list Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers Hello Paul I totally agry with you on that. I think that there are a lot more ideas out there buy people that have been doing this for a long time, and people that are yet to come. bfn James -- From: Paul Lemm paul.l...@sky.com Sent: Wednesday, August 07, 2013 6:59 PM To: 'Gamers Discussion list' gamers@audyssey.org Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers Hi Shaun, Although I definitely haven't been into audio games, played as many or followed the scene for as long as you so can't really comment on whether it has slowed down or not, I think that audio games will keep going. Yep, we have developers go but like you said we have so many people getting into game engines like BGT and some of these people will be the big developers of tomorrow, plus the big developers we have today keep designing new games and I don't doubt new developers will be along in the future to As for audio games itself maybe like you said it has slowed down , but what I see is actually real advances in the audio games being produced, with games pushing the boundaries of what we expect like with swamp. Also there are many new things/projects on their way such as the 3d engine (sorry I can't remember what it was called I want to say genesis but am not sure if that's it or not) being developed by Thomas, there's the new 3D RPG game that Aprone is developing that will work with the see munkey and I'm sure that other developers are working on new titles to So I do think audio games will continue to grow and develop and I would be really interested to see in a few years the quality and types of games there will be. Agreed though that I think we will continue to see an increase in games for platforms like IOS etc. I do think though that PC's will continue to be a part of most households for many many more years to come, in fact I know many people who play main stream games and prefer to play them on a PC. I think although we have smart phones and stuff I think that some people don't want to spend the money on these devices which once brought can't be upgraded as easily as say a PC where people can replace and upgrade components as they wish. Paul -Original Message- From: Gamers [mailto:gamers-boun...@audyssey.org] On Behalf Of shaun everiss Sent: Wednesday, August 07, 2013 8:17 AM To: Gamers Discussion list Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers Hi denis. just read the article. Its quite good. One of my frustrations I have is actually finding more content. I have brought or at least owned or at least played on others systems amost 99% of all blind games in existance. One thing the article did not touch on was the bgt and other toolkit engines making it easier for the average user to put together a game. In fact this is the reason I still can find the occational game. I am in fact testing one such game series right now called deathmatch. And I can appreciate how hard it is to develop games for the blind I am not programming it but at the same time I am previding sfx and beta testing things as well as extra things. I am not even hacking it and its hard enough. The article was vary well written and definately an enjoyable read. As for a cure for blindness that is probably as far off as a mainstream game. while some conditions such as genetic blindness and maybe detatched retena can be prevented/handled right now. at least with my condition once its detatched for long enough ie since birth me being 31 there is no way to actually even get that fixed. And its all cash for the big companies. If anything I suspect that in another hundred years or so we will probably loose a lot of the startup developers that have been moving along. Most have lives that mean they can't produce that much all the time. So I think we may depend on the toolkit engines more and more. And even eventually that to may dry up. I used to think the blind gaming industry could continue at a sertain level. And while bits of it are moving quite quickly I have seen the gaming industry almost stopped barely ticking over sertainly not as fast paced as it was in the beginning and I have been on here since 1995 which is vary close to that beginning. I do see the end of all blind gaming
Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
Hi Paul, Smile. Actually, when I began writing the engine I initially named it Genesis 3D, but then I discovered there was a mainstream game engine by that name so decided to change the name to Evolution 3D which I happen to like better. Anyway, you are right that tools like Evolution will help grow the industry. One very big difference in my Evolution Engine and something like BGT is I have now successfully ported it from Windows to Linux, and have plans to port it to Mac OS X in the future. If and when I make it public that will help grow the industry on non-Windows platforms as the tools are the same, the APIs are the same, and other than some changes in path variables etc the engine should compile just fine on any platform with SDL 1.2.15 or higher and the GNU C++ compiler. I can see why you didn't see the slow down as well. By 2007-2008 most of the audio games had been written and we were beginning to enter the slow down phase. Oh, there was Railracer from Blind Adrenaline, my version of Montezuma's Revenge, my Star Trek Final Conflict, and a few other games that came out about that time, but the number of games that came out during that time were less than half what we saw three or four years earlier. I'm trying to think but I believe around 2003-2004 that's when PB Games, now Blastbay, was active and Phillip was cranking out all kinds of games like Dark Destroyer, Tarzan Junior, 3D Snake, Tick-Tack-Toe, the Snowball War, Showdown, and there might have been a couple of others. Thing is just in a couple of years one developer was putting out more games than we have seen in the last five which is really quite sad. Still, on the bright side some of the games we have seen over the last five years have been revolutionary in their own way. We have SoundRTS the first full real time strategy game which is an ongoing project. We have Time of Conflict which is another real time strategy game which is one of GMA's best games to date. We have Entombed which is a decent roguelike RPG. If not for the bugs in the game I'd have said it was the best game written in years. We have Castaways which is still an addictive game and I often play it now and then because it reminds me of games like Dwarf Fortress which is not a genre and style ever tried before. Swamp isn't the first FPS game, but it is the first to get into network play in a big way. Audio Quake gets the credit for being the first, but Swamp is way more popular and in many ways new and revolutionary in a way Audio Quake was not. The point being here that while game production has slowed down what we have gotten are some truly amazing games. As I said before its more quality now over quantity. Cheers! On 8/8/13, Paul Lemm paul.l...@sky.com wrote: Hi Thomas, Evolution 3D, I knew as soon as I heard the name I'd remember., my guess of genesis couldn't have been much further wrong than evolution lol. although the engine will be for experienced developers it is another project in the audio game community that will ultimately aid these developers and therefore help grow the industry. That would explain why I didn't see the slowdown in the industry , since I probably didn't play my first audio game until about 2007 or 2008 when a lot of the games you talked about had already been released I think though that although it has slowed down, like main stream games audio games will continue with games getting bigger, more in depth, complex and using new ideas and approaches like you said with a focus on quality rather than quantity and I think we'd all say that's a good thing. All that being said though, just like main stream games no matter how much games have changed and technology moves on some of the older games will always be some of the best ones. Paul --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. 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/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
Thanks Dennis! Awesome article! You know, the audio sample is actually Jedi Quake? :) -Also is using a community-created sound pack! Just FYI! :) Thanks so much for sharing this! Smiles, Cara :) --- View my Online Portfolio at: http://www.onemodelplace.com/CaraQuinn Follow me on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ModelCara On Aug 6, 2013, at 7:48 PM, Dennis Towne s...@xirr.com wrote: Hey all, Richard Moss just put up a really long, really good article on blind gaming. A lot of the games that come up here are mentioned. It's totally worth a read. The link is: http://www.polygon.com/features/2013/8/6/4550490/blind-games-rock-vibe Dennis Towne Alter Aeon MUD http://www.alteraeon.com --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. 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/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. 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/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
Hi denis. just read the article. Its quite good. One of my frustrations I have is actually finding more content. I have brought or at least owned or at least played on others systems amost 99% of all blind games in existance. One thing the article did not touch on was the bgt and other toolkit engines making it easier for the average user to put together a game. In fact this is the reason I still can find the occational game. I am in fact testing one such game series right now called deathmatch. And I can appreciate how hard it is to develop games for the blind I am not programming it but at the same time I am previding sfx and beta testing things as well as extra things. I am not even hacking it and its hard enough. The article was vary well written and definately an enjoyable read. As for a cure for blindness that is probably as far off as a mainstream game. while some conditions such as genetic blindness and maybe detatched retena can be prevented/handled right now. at least with my condition once its detatched for long enough ie since birth me being 31 there is no way to actually even get that fixed. And its all cash for the big companies. If anything I suspect that in another hundred years or so we will probably loose a lot of the startup developers that have been moving along. Most have lives that mean they can't produce that much all the time. So I think we may depend on the toolkit engines more and more. And even eventually that to may dry up. I used to think the blind gaming industry could continue at a sertain level. And while bits of it are moving quite quickly I have seen the gaming industry almost stopped barely ticking over sertainly not as fast paced as it was in the beginning and I have been on here since 1995 which is vary close to that beginning. I do see the end of all blind gaming though. We are only moving right now because of muds, web based games, opensource games, free games and those created by the engines and other kits. True there are still a bunch of the devs that still produce games, and a few core ones still continue for now. What is a major concern is that no really new big names are replacing the older ones. Once the main comercial devs go, that will be it. I don't mean that I will see the end of gaming, I am sure that for the next 1-300 years blind gaming will find a way to continue slowly grinding along. But unless there is some big push wether it be mainstreaming or funding, I think its prity much going to die. Lets face it, blind game development is not a job. Unless you make expensive software brought by governments for the blind to use like jaws there is no cash in it really. I do think that if the gaming community is to survive that a lot of it at least for a while will exist on the iphone and android devices. I am not sure about pc users, even mainstream games have been moving away from pcs and into consoles. some newer consoles like the nvidia shield are supposed to be android which in theory means you could run apps but even then, mostly its geared for sight. In the old days I remember playing audioquake with the jedy quake and overkill mods but really never managed to comnplete an entire game successfully. Its also interesting to note that aprone and swamp and the see monkey were not mentioned as that is definately one approach in the next direction for the gaming platforms for the blind. I suspect that at the end of it all the industry will not die but it will probably slump its already moving at least to the outside user like myself quite slowly though only those at the core will know of its actual speed. At 02:48 PM 8/7/2013, you wrote: Hey all, Richard Moss just put up a really long, really good article on blind gaming. A lot of the games that come up here are mentioned. It's totally worth a read. The link is: http://www.polygon.com/features/2013/8/6/4550490/blind-games-rock-vibe Dennis Towne Alter Aeon MUD http://www.alteraeon.com --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. 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/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. 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/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
hI Dennis Thank you for sharing that it was a good read. In fact I think I'm going to put it on my facebook. bfn James -- From: Dennis Towne s...@xirr.com Sent: Tuesday, August 06, 2013 10:48 PM To: Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Subject: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers Hey all, Richard Moss just put up a really long, really good article on blind gaming. A lot of the games that come up here are mentioned. It's totally worth a read. The link is: http://www.polygon.com/features/2013/8/6/4550490/blind-games-rock-vibe Dennis Towne Alter Aeon MUD http://www.alteraeon.com --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. 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/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. 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/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
Hi Shaun, I think you are being overly pessimistic here. As long as there is someone who is blind or sighted willing to create accessible games they will always be around. I don't see audio games dying so much as evolving, changing, and moving away from its traditional roots the way any evolving technology does. Yes, it may be possible games for the PC may become a thing of the past, but let's be realistic here. The PC as we know it is becoming a thing of the past itself in many ways. Today many sighted computer users are carrying around smart phones like the Apple iPhone or the Droid phones that are as much computer as phone. There are tablet devices like the iPad and Droid tablets that pretty much are hand-held computers for the 21st century. It is clear this is where the computer industry is heading and in a few short years it is likely the only place you will find a desktop computer is in someone's office or other places of business. Otherwise most average mainstream consumers will have a smart phone, tablet, or possibly a netbook. However, audio games will have to shift their focus from Windows PCs to newer markets and probably will. We are already seeing the results of this in action. Just over the last two/three years we are seeing a huge explosion of accessible games come onto the market for the Apple iOS platform, and I look for that to continue. It is in many ways where our future lies for the short term and probably for the long term too. I look for most things to move to smart phones and other mobile devices over the next ten to twenty years as they replace traditional desktop and laptop computers in the average household. There still may be a PC market, but how large it will be is hard to say. My guess is at first it will be made up of netbooks and laptops which are already outselling desktop units by quite a big margin. If audio games are going to continue and survive on that platform our developers are going to have to give up a few old technologies like Visual Basic 6 and learn .NET or something else designed for the modern Windows OS or will be left behind. That's what really concerns me for the short term, because while I am certain audio games will continue in the main I see some of our big name developers simply cease to be a driving force in the audio games community as newer languages, operating systems, and technologies renders them obsolete. Those developers who are hanging onto XP with a death grip may hang on a few more years, and will simply be a thing of the past just like their favorite OS, but sooner or later someone will replace them in time. For one thing there are tools like BGT which can help jump start a new generation of accessible game developers. They may not be very good at it at first, as is to be expected, but BGT is probably going to be the new VB 6 for a lot of new accessible game developers. Its designed largely for a modern PC so is an obvious place to start for Windows developers. Besides BGT there is Python, there are the .NET languages, etc which will likely lend themselves to be decent entry points into the modern audio games market as well. In short, I see our audio game developers falling behind, but I see new developers coming along eventually to replace them. It may not happen over night, might not happen tomorrow, but sooner or later someone will keep the torch burning and take audio games in a different direction. As to your comment about mainstream games moving to consoles it should be made clear you are only talking about big name developers. You have totally ignored the topic of indi game developers who are creating and selling games for Windows, Mac, Linux etc and are a market force of their own. There are far more mainstream games for PC than console, and the only reason you probably don't know of them is because you aren't on Steam or similar service to buy new mainstream games for the PC. However, I am bringing this up to say that as we are an indi group ourselves our future is largely determined by the fate of the rest of the indi games community. Cheers! On 8/7/13, shaun everiss sm.ever...@gmail.com wrote: Hi denis. just read the article. Its quite good. One of my frustrations I have is actually finding more content. I have brought or at least owned or at least played on others systems amost 99% of all blind games in existance. One thing the article did not touch on was the bgt and other toolkit engines making it easier for the average user to put together a game. In fact this is the reason I still can find the occational game. I am in fact testing one such game series right now called deathmatch. And I can appreciate how hard it is to develop games for the blind I am not programming it but at the same time I am previding sfx and beta testing things as well as extra things. I am not even hacking it and its hard enough. The article was vary well written and definately an enjoyable read. As for a cure for blindness that
Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
The old joke reminder about computer evolution is they've said in past that the original computing power made use of to handle apollo11's moon landing process was less than your average scientific calculator has in it nowadays - imagine how a smart phone/PDA compares then..? smile And, here's one of the standard, ongoing discussions about this topic, where they quote a few figures, etc.: http://www.lonelyplanet.com/thorntree/thread.jspa?threadID=1756676 Jacob Kruger Blind Biker Skype: BlindZA '...fate had broken his body, but not his spirit...' - Original Message - From: Thomas Ward thomasward1...@gmail.com To: Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Wednesday, August 07, 2013 4:16 PM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers Hi Shaun, I think you are being overly pessimistic here. As long as there is someone who is blind or sighted willing to create accessible games they will always be around. I don't see audio games dying so much as evolving, changing, and moving away from its traditional roots the way any evolving technology does. Yes, it may be possible games for the PC may become a thing of the past, but let's be realistic here. The PC as we know it is becoming a thing of the past itself in many ways. Today many sighted computer users are carrying around smart phones like the Apple iPhone or the Droid phones that are as much computer as phone. There are tablet devices like the iPad and Droid tablets that pretty much are hand-held computers for the 21st century. It is clear this is where the computer industry is heading and in a few short years it is likely the only place you will find a desktop computer is in someone's office or other places of business. Otherwise most average mainstream consumers will have a smart phone, tablet, or possibly a netbook. However, audio games will have to shift their focus from Windows PCs to newer markets and probably will. We are already seeing the results of this in action. Just over the last two/three years we are seeing a huge explosion of accessible games come onto the market for the Apple iOS platform, and I look for that to continue. It is in many ways where our future lies for the short term and probably for the long term too. I look for most things to move to smart phones and other mobile devices over the next ten to twenty years as they replace traditional desktop and laptop computers in the average household. There still may be a PC market, but how large it will be is hard to say. My guess is at first it will be made up of netbooks and laptops which are already outselling desktop units by quite a big margin. If audio games are going to continue and survive on that platform our developers are going to have to give up a few old technologies like Visual Basic 6 and learn .NET or something else designed for the modern Windows OS or will be left behind. That's what really concerns me for the short term, because while I am certain audio games will continue in the main I see some of our big name developers simply cease to be a driving force in the audio games community as newer languages, operating systems, and technologies renders them obsolete. Those developers who are hanging onto XP with a death grip may hang on a few more years, and will simply be a thing of the past just like their favorite OS, but sooner or later someone will replace them in time. For one thing there are tools like BGT which can help jump start a new generation of accessible game developers. They may not be very good at it at first, as is to be expected, but BGT is probably going to be the new VB 6 for a lot of new accessible game developers. Its designed largely for a modern PC so is an obvious place to start for Windows developers. Besides BGT there is Python, there are the .NET languages, etc which will likely lend themselves to be decent entry points into the modern audio games market as well. In short, I see our audio game developers falling behind, but I see new developers coming along eventually to replace them. It may not happen over night, might not happen tomorrow, but sooner or later someone will keep the torch burning and take audio games in a different direction. As to your comment about mainstream games moving to consoles it should be made clear you are only talking about big name developers. You have totally ignored the topic of indi game developers who are creating and selling games for Windows, Mac, Linux etc and are a market force of their own. There are far more mainstream games for PC than console, and the only reason you probably don't know of them is because you aren't on Steam or similar service to buy new mainstream games for the PC. However, I am bringing this up to say that as we are an indi group ourselves our future is largely determined by the fate of the rest of the indi games community. Cheers! On 8/7/13, shaun everiss sm.ever...@gmail.com wrote: Hi denis. just read the article. Its quite good. One
Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
true tom I am adicted to the pc though this is the only market I know I may get a mobile device at some point then I will probably join the mobile marketplace. and yes its fair to say that the pc market for the sighted has shrunk quite a lot. At 02:16 AM 8/8/2013, you wrote: Hi Shaun, I think you are being overly pessimistic here. As long as there is someone who is blind or sighted willing to create accessible games they will always be around. I don't see audio games dying so much as evolving, changing, and moving away from its traditional roots the way any evolving technology does. Yes, it may be possible games for the PC may become a thing of the past, but let's be realistic here. The PC as we know it is becoming a thing of the past itself in many ways. Today many sighted computer users are carrying around smart phones like the Apple iPhone or the Droid phones that are as much computer as phone. There are tablet devices like the iPad and Droid tablets that pretty much are hand-held computers for the 21st century. It is clear this is where the computer industry is heading and in a few short years it is likely the only place you will find a desktop computer is in someone's office or other places of business. Otherwise most average mainstream consumers will have a smart phone, tablet, or possibly a netbook. However, audio games will have to shift their focus from Windows PCs to newer markets and probably will. We are already seeing the results of this in action. Just over the last two/three years we are seeing a huge explosion of accessible games come onto the market for the Apple iOS platform, and I look for that to continue. It is in many ways where our future lies for the short term and probably for the long term too. I look for most things to move to smart phones and other mobile devices over the next ten to twenty years as they replace traditional desktop and laptop computers in the average household. There still may be a PC market, but how large it will be is hard to say. My guess is at first it will be made up of netbooks and laptops which are already outselling desktop units by quite a big margin. If audio games are going to continue and survive on that platform our developers are going to have to give up a few old technologies like Visual Basic 6 and learn .NET or something else designed for the modern Windows OS or will be left behind. That's what really concerns me for the short term, because while I am certain audio games will continue in the main I see some of our big name developers simply cease to be a driving force in the audio games community as newer languages, operating systems, and technologies renders them obsolete. Those developers who are hanging onto XP with a death grip may hang on a few more years, and will simply be a thing of the past just like their favorite OS, but sooner or later someone will replace them in time. For one thing there are tools like BGT which can help jump start a new generation of accessible game developers. They may not be very good at it at first, as is to be expected, but BGT is probably going to be the new VB 6 for a lot of new accessible game developers. Its designed largely for a modern PC so is an obvious place to start for Windows developers. Besides BGT there is Python, there are the .NET languages, etc which will likely lend themselves to be decent entry points into the modern audio games market as well. In short, I see our audio game developers falling behind, but I see new developers coming along eventually to replace them. It may not happen over night, might not happen tomorrow, but sooner or later someone will keep the torch burning and take audio games in a different direction. As to your comment about mainstream games moving to consoles it should be made clear you are only talking about big name developers. You have totally ignored the topic of indi game developers who are creating and selling games for Windows, Mac, Linux etc and are a market force of their own. There are far more mainstream games for PC than console, and the only reason you probably don't know of them is because you aren't on Steam or similar service to buy new mainstream games for the PC. However, I am bringing this up to say that as we are an indi group ourselves our future is largely determined by the fate of the rest of the indi games community. Cheers! On 8/7/13, shaun everiss sm.ever...@gmail.com wrote: Hi denis. just read the article. Its quite good. One of my frustrations I have is actually finding more content. I have brought or at least owned or at least played on others systems amost 99% of all blind games in existance. One thing the article did not touch on was the bgt and other toolkit engines making it easier for the average user to put together a game. In fact this is the reason I still can find the occational game. I am in fact testing one such game series right now called deathmatch. And I can appreciate how hard it is to develop
Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
Hi Shaun, Although I definitely haven't been into audio games, played as many or followed the scene for as long as you so can't really comment on whether it has slowed down or not, I think that audio games will keep going. Yep, we have developers go but like you said we have so many people getting into game engines like BGT and some of these people will be the big developers of tomorrow, plus the big developers we have today keep designing new games and I don't doubt new developers will be along in the future to As for audio games itself maybe like you said it has slowed down , but what I see is actually real advances in the audio games being produced, with games pushing the boundaries of what we expect like with swamp. Also there are many new things/projects on their way such as the 3d engine (sorry I can't remember what it was called I want to say genesis but am not sure if that's it or not) being developed by Thomas, there's the new 3D RPG game that Aprone is developing that will work with the see munkey and I'm sure that other developers are working on new titles to So I do think audio games will continue to grow and develop and I would be really interested to see in a few years the quality and types of games there will be. Agreed though that I think we will continue to see an increase in games for platforms like IOS etc. I do think though that PC's will continue to be a part of most households for many many more years to come, in fact I know many people who play main stream games and prefer to play them on a PC. I think although we have smart phones and stuff I think that some people don't want to spend the money on these devices which once brought can't be upgraded as easily as say a PC where people can replace and upgrade components as they wish. Paul -Original Message- From: Gamers [mailto:gamers-boun...@audyssey.org] On Behalf Of shaun everiss Sent: Wednesday, August 07, 2013 8:17 AM To: Gamers Discussion list Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers Hi denis. just read the article. Its quite good. One of my frustrations I have is actually finding more content. I have brought or at least owned or at least played on others systems amost 99% of all blind games in existance. One thing the article did not touch on was the bgt and other toolkit engines making it easier for the average user to put together a game. In fact this is the reason I still can find the occational game. I am in fact testing one such game series right now called deathmatch. And I can appreciate how hard it is to develop games for the blind I am not programming it but at the same time I am previding sfx and beta testing things as well as extra things. I am not even hacking it and its hard enough. The article was vary well written and definately an enjoyable read. As for a cure for blindness that is probably as far off as a mainstream game. while some conditions such as genetic blindness and maybe detatched retena can be prevented/handled right now. at least with my condition once its detatched for long enough ie since birth me being 31 there is no way to actually even get that fixed. And its all cash for the big companies. If anything I suspect that in another hundred years or so we will probably loose a lot of the startup developers that have been moving along. Most have lives that mean they can't produce that much all the time. So I think we may depend on the toolkit engines more and more. And even eventually that to may dry up. I used to think the blind gaming industry could continue at a sertain level. And while bits of it are moving quite quickly I have seen the gaming industry almost stopped barely ticking over sertainly not as fast paced as it was in the beginning and I have been on here since 1995 which is vary close to that beginning. I do see the end of all blind gaming though. We are only moving right now because of muds, web based games, opensource games, free games and those created by the engines and other kits. True there are still a bunch of the devs that still produce games, and a few core ones still continue for now. What is a major concern is that no really new big names are replacing the older ones. Once the main comercial devs go, that will be it. I don't mean that I will see the end of gaming, I am sure that for the next 1-300 years blind gaming will find a way to continue slowly grinding along. But unless there is some big push wether it be mainstreaming or funding, I think its prity much going to die. Lets face it, blind game development is not a job. Unless you make expensive software brought by governments for the blind to use like jaws there is no cash in it really. I do think that if the gaming community is to survive that a lot of it at least for a while will exist on the iphone and android devices. I am not sure about pc users, even mainstream games have been moving away from pcs and into consoles. some newer consoles like the nvidia shield
Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
true paul. I suspect that the industry grew fast maybe to fast in the first 5 years of opperation and now it may actually be at its natural speed. Saying that part of me is hoping that this slump will actually reverse. Though on that note sighted friends I do things with have been slowing down on games. the new games are far to expensive for some and they wait for them to drop down a bit. Yes some of us complain about 30 or 40 dollar games but I have known games for the sighted to be 80 dollars pluss to the 100 or 140 dollar range so in that respect we are getting off quite well. Ofcause with blindsoftware going which was sad, and others it is just another movement in the history of bind gaming. Ofcause every time a dev goes especially if they take their licenced games with them it opens up the possibility of making sinular games by others. Then we have games like dragon pong which has no single player port and another dev wrote with permition a simular port of the game with maybe not as many chars but the same none the less so there you go. I guess I was hoping for more fast paced action though who could keep that up. Its probably that the industry moves but you don't notice it if you don't actively watch it. OOn an interesting note I have been getting bored of audio games so dropped back to the roots of the industry and went back to interactive fiction. the inform7 zblorb games on ifarchive are quite good, I am starting to play a new series of things. At 10:59 AM 8/8/2013, you wrote: Hi Shaun, Although I definitely haven't been into audio games, played as many or followed the scene for as long as you so can't really comment on whether it has slowed down or not, I think that audio games will keep going. Yep, we have developers go but like you said we have so many people getting into game engines like BGT and some of these people will be the big developers of tomorrow, plus the big developers we have today keep designing new games and I don't doubt new developers will be along in the future to As for audio games itself maybe like you said it has slowed down , but what I see is actually real advances in the audio games being produced, with games pushing the boundaries of what we expect like with swamp. Also there are many new things/projects on their way such as the 3d engine (sorry I can't remember what it was called I want to say genesis but am not sure if that's it or not) being developed by Thomas, there's the new 3D RPG game that Aprone is developing that will work with the see munkey and I'm sure that other developers are working on new titles to So I do think audio games will continue to grow and develop and I would be really interested to see in a few years the quality and types of games there will be. Agreed though that I think we will continue to see an increase in games for platforms like IOS etc. I do think though that PC's will continue to be a part of most households for many many more years to come, in fact I know many people who play main stream games and prefer to play them on a PC. I think although we have smart phones and stuff I think that some people don't want to spend the money on these devices which once brought can't be upgraded as easily as say a PC where people can replace and upgrade components as they wish. Paul -Original Message- From: Gamers [mailto:gamers-boun...@audyssey.org] On Behalf Of shaun everiss Sent: Wednesday, August 07, 2013 8:17 AM To: Gamers Discussion list Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers Hi denis. just read the article. Its quite good. One of my frustrations I have is actually finding more content. I have brought or at least owned or at least played on others systems amost 99% of all blind games in existance. One thing the article did not touch on was the bgt and other toolkit engines making it easier for the average user to put together a game. In fact this is the reason I still can find the occational game. I am in fact testing one such game series right now called deathmatch. And I can appreciate how hard it is to develop games for the blind I am not programming it but at the same time I am previding sfx and beta testing things as well as extra things. I am not even hacking it and its hard enough. The article was vary well written and definately an enjoyable read. As for a cure for blindness that is probably as far off as a mainstream game. while some conditions such as genetic blindness and maybe detatched retena can be prevented/handled right now. at least with my condition once its detatched for long enough ie since birth me being 31 there is no way to actually even get that fixed. And its all cash for the big companies. If anything I suspect that in another hundred years or so we will probably loose a lot of the startup developers that have been moving along. Most have lives that mean they can't produce that much all the time. So I think we may depend on the toolkit engines
Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
Hi Shaun, About the early growth of the industry it is true that the industry sprang up really fast once it really got going. At first it was just three or four developers like PCs Games, Kitchens Inc, GMA, and a couple of others writing games for Dos. Then around 1999 or 2000 the audio games industry really took off with the introduction of VB 6 and DirectX 8. I'd say in the space of about five years between 99 and 2004 the audio games industry was truly born. Jim Kitchen began porting all of his games to Windows. GMA also ported their games like Trek and Lone Wolf to Windows as well as came out with Shades of Doom and Tank Commander.BSC Games got started and put out a good solid half a dozen releases like Troopanum, Hunter, Pipe, Deekout, Bobby's Revenge, and so on. ESP, then owned by James North, came out with an impressive catalog of games including Dynaman, Alien Outback, Monkey Business, ESP Pinball Classic, ESP Whoopass, etc. Liam started L-Works and came out with Egg Hunt, Lockpick, Super Liam, and the Great Toy Robbery. Robert Betz, AKA Games for the Blind, was putting out a handful of card and board games. When you look at it objectively just in that period of time between 1999 and 2004 almost all of the major audio game releases were developed and released, and after that the industry has rapidly slowed and stopped since then. There are, of course, some good reasons for that slow down in development. First of all, many of the original founders like ESP, BSC Games, Robert Betz, Bavisoft, etc are no longer around. With ESP we are fortunate that James North turned his games over to Josh for development, but in the case of BSC, Robert Betz, and a few other developers we aren't that lucky. Even if they had turned the source code for their games over to someone else it would have to be rewritten which brings me to the second reason game development has slowed. Back in the late 90's and early 2000's a developer's options were simple. They could go the advanced route and develop their games in C++ the hard way using DirectX etc or they could use Visual Basic with DirectX which was a much easier choice. Jim Kitchen, GMA Games, ESP, BSC Games, Robert Betz, and so forth all took the VB 6 option which was completely reasonable for the time. However, in 2008 Microsoft officially scrapped VB 6, and unfortunately the majority of those developers had not switched to .NET or some other modern alternative so that their older games will have technical problems with newer versions of Windows. Fixing said issues requires a complete rewrite in VB .NET or something else compatible with Windows 7 and Windows 8 which will take considerable time and effort to do. On top of the language issue we are now faced with the fact Windows is not the only operating system we need to concern ourselves with. A number of blind users have gone Mac, and that is a new market that hasn't been fully supported yet. There are iOS devices like iPhones and iPads which have exploded onto the market with hundreds of blind customers asking for more games. There is a minority market that includes myself running Linux which is reasonably accessible and is one more market ripe with potential customers. The bottom line I have spent more time on trying to figure out how to develop games for these new platforms than I have in writing games. Josh also has also put considerable time and effort into developing cross-platform tools for Mac, Windows, and iOS that took something like two or three years to get to a state where he could put out Silver Dollar and Change Reaction. The bottom line cross-platform development is hard, is a lot of work, and wasn't even an issue 10 to 15 years ago when the audio games market was made up exclusively of blind Windows users. In short, between the loss of developers and the change in technologies this loll in game development should not come as any big surprise. Its more complicated than it use to be, and we don't have as many people working on it as we use to. I'm hoping that BGT and other technologies like it will help with the problem, but the tool is only as good as the developer using it which is one more problem we have against us. For example, take the discussion a few days ago with John about math and such. If a new developer doesn't have the mathematical skills etc to competently develop a certain type of audio game BGT is not going to help with that. It will be up to us more skilled developers to train and teach the next generation of game developers so they know what they are doing which takes time and energy too. Cheers! On 8/7/13, shaun everiss sm.ever...@gmail.com wrote: true paul. I suspect that the industry grew fast maybe to fast in the first 5 years of opperation and now it may actually be at its natural speed. Saying that part of me is hoping that this slump will actually reverse. Though on that note sighted friends I do things with have been slowing down on games. the new games
Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
Hi Paul, Well, there is a lot of truth to the fact that the audio games industry is slowing down. As I explained in my prior post most of the audio games out today were developed between 1999 and 2004 which is a remarkably short span of time. On the other hand the games developed after 2004 have more depth and complexity to them such as Entombed, Swamp, Time of Conflict, and so on. So while the development of audio games have slowed down what we have gotten are more in depth products than we saw in that first five years of the industry. The focus now seems to be quality over quantity. As far as developers like the BGT developers being the next big game companies of the future that remains to be seen. Mostly what I've seen in BGT is pretty simplistic stuff, some developers come out with one or two games, and disappear never to be heard from again. So I am skeptical of how much an impact it may or may not have long term. As for my own engine, Evolution 3D, its not designed for amateurs so unless a game developer knows exactly what they are doing they won't be able to use it. I've thought of rewriting it with a BGT type scripting interface, but don't want to take the time or effort on that. Cheers! On 8/7/13, Paul Lemm paul.l...@sky.com wrote: Hi Shaun, Although I definitely haven't been into audio games, played as many or followed the scene for as long as you so can't really comment on whether it has slowed down or not, I think that audio games will keep going. Yep, we have developers go but like you said we have so many people getting into game engines like BGT and some of these people will be the big developers of tomorrow, plus the big developers we have today keep designing new games and I don't doubt new developers will be along in the future to As for audio games itself maybe like you said it has slowed down , but what I see is actually real advances in the audio games being produced, with games pushing the boundaries of what we expect like with swamp. Also there are many new things/projects on their way such as the 3d engine (sorry I can't remember what it was called I want to say genesis but am not sure if that's it or not) being developed by Thomas, there's the new 3D RPG game that Aprone is developing that will work with the see munkey and I'm sure that other developers are working on new titles to So I do think audio games will continue to grow and develop and I would be really interested to see in a few years the quality and types of games there will be. Agreed though that I think we will continue to see an increase in games for platforms like IOS etc. I do think though that PC's will continue to be a part of most households for many many more years to come, in fact I know many people who play main stream games and prefer to play them on a PC. I think although we have smart phones and stuff I think that some people don't want to spend the money on these devices which once brought can't be upgraded as easily as say a PC where people can replace and upgrade components as they wish. Paul --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. 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/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
Hi Jacob, Yeah, there is quite a bit of debate about that, but to be fair to the Apollo 11's computer it was sufficient enough for the job. I believe it was a 2.4 MHZ processor which sounds really lame today, but it didn't have to handle 3d graphics or a lot of the other crap our computers have to do today. The onboard computer mainly had to do scientific calculations, run the life support, and could display the output on screen in text readouts. So while it is true your smart phone etc is superior in every way to the Apollo's computer, but the Apollo 11's computer worked for what they needed it to do which is all that mattered. Cheers! On 8/7/13, Jacob Kruger ja...@blindza.co.za wrote: The old joke reminder about computer evolution is they've said in past that the original computing power made use of to handle apollo11's moon landing process was less than your average scientific calculator has in it nowadays - imagine how a smart phone/PDA compares then..? smile --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. 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/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
Hello Paul I totally agry with you on that. I think that there are a lot more ideas out there buy people that have been doing this for a long time, and people that are yet to come. bfn James -- From: Paul Lemm paul.l...@sky.com Sent: Wednesday, August 07, 2013 6:59 PM To: 'Gamers Discussion list' gamers@audyssey.org Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers Hi Shaun, Although I definitely haven't been into audio games, played as many or followed the scene for as long as you so can't really comment on whether it has slowed down or not, I think that audio games will keep going. Yep, we have developers go but like you said we have so many people getting into game engines like BGT and some of these people will be the big developers of tomorrow, plus the big developers we have today keep designing new games and I don't doubt new developers will be along in the future to As for audio games itself maybe like you said it has slowed down , but what I see is actually real advances in the audio games being produced, with games pushing the boundaries of what we expect like with swamp. Also there are many new things/projects on their way such as the 3d engine (sorry I can't remember what it was called I want to say genesis but am not sure if that's it or not) being developed by Thomas, there's the new 3D RPG game that Aprone is developing that will work with the see munkey and I'm sure that other developers are working on new titles to So I do think audio games will continue to grow and develop and I would be really interested to see in a few years the quality and types of games there will be. Agreed though that I think we will continue to see an increase in games for platforms like IOS etc. I do think though that PC's will continue to be a part of most households for many many more years to come, in fact I know many people who play main stream games and prefer to play them on a PC. I think although we have smart phones and stuff I think that some people don't want to spend the money on these devices which once brought can't be upgraded as easily as say a PC where people can replace and upgrade components as they wish. Paul -Original Message- From: Gamers [mailto:gamers-boun...@audyssey.org] On Behalf Of shaun everiss Sent: Wednesday, August 07, 2013 8:17 AM To: Gamers Discussion list Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers Hi denis. just read the article. Its quite good. One of my frustrations I have is actually finding more content. I have brought or at least owned or at least played on others systems amost 99% of all blind games in existance. One thing the article did not touch on was the bgt and other toolkit engines making it easier for the average user to put together a game. In fact this is the reason I still can find the occational game. I am in fact testing one such game series right now called deathmatch. And I can appreciate how hard it is to develop games for the blind I am not programming it but at the same time I am previding sfx and beta testing things as well as extra things. I am not even hacking it and its hard enough. The article was vary well written and definately an enjoyable read. As for a cure for blindness that is probably as far off as a mainstream game. while some conditions such as genetic blindness and maybe detatched retena can be prevented/handled right now. at least with my condition once its detatched for long enough ie since birth me being 31 there is no way to actually even get that fixed. And its all cash for the big companies. If anything I suspect that in another hundred years or so we will probably loose a lot of the startup developers that have been moving along. Most have lives that mean they can't produce that much all the time. So I think we may depend on the toolkit engines more and more. And even eventually that to may dry up. I used to think the blind gaming industry could continue at a sertain level. And while bits of it are moving quite quickly I have seen the gaming industry almost stopped barely ticking over sertainly not as fast paced as it was in the beginning and I have been on here since 1995 which is vary close to that beginning. I do see the end of all blind gaming though. We are only moving right now because of muds, web based games, opensource games, free games and those created by the engines and other kits. True there are still a bunch of the devs that still produce games, and a few core ones still continue for now. What is a major concern is that no really new big names are replacing the older ones. Once the main comercial devs go, that will be it. I don't mean that I will see the end of gaming, I am sure that for the next 1-300 years blind gaming will find a way to continue slowly grinding along. But unless there is some big push wether it be mainstreaming or funding, I think its prity much going
Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
Hello Thomas, yes, I have to agree with you. Roberts games was the first games that I played, and that's how I discovered the Window-Eyes screen reader, as it was one of the options in the game. -Original Message- From: Gamers [mailto:gamers-boun...@audyssey.org] On Behalf Of Thomas Ward Sent: Wednesday, August 07, 2013 7:46 PM To: Gamers Discussion list Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers Hi Shaun, About the early growth of the industry it is true that the industry sprang up really fast once it really got going. At first it was just three or four developers like PCs Games, Kitchens Inc, GMA, and a couple of others writing games for Dos. Then around 1999 or 2000 the audio games industry really took off with the introduction of VB 6 and DirectX 8. I'd say in the space of about five years between 99 and 2004 the audio games industry was truly born. Jim Kitchen began porting all of his games to Windows. GMA also ported their games like Trek and Lone Wolf to Windows as well as came out with Shades of Doom and Tank Commander.BSC Games got started and put out a good solid half a dozen releases like Troopanum, Hunter, Pipe, Deekout, Bobby's Revenge, and so on. ESP, then owned by James North, came out with an impressive catalog of games including Dynaman, Alien Outback, Monkey Business, ESP Pinball Classic, ESP Whoopass, etc. Liam started L-Works and came out with Egg Hunt, Lockpick, Super Liam, and the Great Toy Robbery. Robert Betz, AKA Games for the Blind, was putting out a handful of card and board games. When you look at it objectively just in that period of time between 1999 and 2004 almost all of the major audio game releases were developed and released, and after that the industry has rapidly slowed and stopped since then. There are, of course, some good reasons for that slow down in development. First of all, many of the original founders like ESP, BSC Games, Robert Betz, Bavisoft, etc are no longer around. With ESP we are fortunate that James North turned his games over to Josh for development, but in the case of BSC, Robert Betz, and a few other developers we aren't that lucky. Even if they had turned the source code for their games over to someone else it would have to be rewritten which brings me to the second reason game development has slowed. Back in the late 90's and early 2000's a developer's options were simple. They could go the advanced route and develop their games in C++ the hard way using DirectX etc or they could use Visual Basic with DirectX which was a much easier choice. Jim Kitchen, GMA Games, ESP, BSC Games, Robert Betz, and so forth all took the VB 6 option which was completely reasonable for the time. However, in 2008 Microsoft officially scrapped VB 6, and unfortunately the majority of those developers had not switched to .NET or some other modern alternative so that their older games will have technical problems with newer versions of Windows. Fixing said issues requires a complete rewrite in VB .NET or something else compatible with Windows 7 and Windows 8 which will take considerable time and effort to do. On top of the language issue we are now faced with the fact Windows is not the only operating system we need to concern ourselves with. A number of blind users have gone Mac, and that is a new market that hasn't been fully supported yet. There are iOS devices like iPhones and iPads which have exploded onto the market with hundreds of blind customers asking for more games. There is a minority market that includes myself running Linux which is reasonably accessible and is one more market ripe with potential customers. The bottom line I have spent more time on trying to figure out how to develop games for these new platforms than I have in writing games. Josh also has also put considerable time and effort into developing cross-platform tools for Mac, Windows, and iOS that took something like two or three years to get to a state where he could put out Silver Dollar and Change Reaction. The bottom line cross-platform development is hard, is a lot of work, and wasn't even an issue 10 to 15 years ago when the audio games market was made up exclusively of blind Windows users. In short, between the loss of developers and the change in technologies this loll in game development should not come as any big surprise. Its more complicated than it use to be, and we don't have as many people working on it as we use to. I'm hoping that BGT and other technologies like it will help with the problem, but the tool is only as good as the developer using it which is one more problem we have against us. For example, take the discussion a few days ago with John about math and such. If a new developer doesn't have the mathematical skills etc to competently develop a certain type of audio game BGT is not going to help with that. It will be up to us more skilled developers to train and teach the next generation of game developers so they know what
[Audyssey] Article on blind games and developers
Hey all, Richard Moss just put up a really long, really good article on blind gaming. A lot of the games that come up here are mentioned. It's totally worth a read. The link is: http://www.polygon.com/features/2013/8/6/4550490/blind-games-rock-vibe Dennis Towne Alter Aeon MUD http://www.alteraeon.com --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. 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/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
