Getting Disabled Gamers Back In the Game
Matthew Boyd has written a great article over at Kwanzoo discussing an issue that’s going to be becoming very important to gamers and to game developers – making games accessible for people with disabilities.
This isn’t just an issue for the the disabled community. As gamers age and as older gamers get included in the gaming market like we’ve seen in the last couple years, the ability to cope with assistive technologies and the ergonomics of aging is going to become more and more important. All those Wii units in old folks homes are just the leaders in a trend. And I can tell you anecdotally that the Wiimote can be a nightmare for people with arthritis or carpel tunnel.
The article has some great stuff about how designers and developers are starting to look at this, and I hope they start looking ahead. If you’d like to know more, I’d head over to AbleGamers and start reading through the forums.
May 20th, 2008 at 12:10 pm
I’m blind in my left eye, but the only thing my disability prevents me from in playing games is anything that involves 3-D glasses or related technology. This includes VR and the Virtua Boy. I’m glad that stuff never took off.
I do have tunnel vision in my right eye, so it’s possible that I suck at shooters and other games where you must look at the WHOLE screen because I can’t see the whole screen because my vision in my right eye is so centralized.
But really, the only real big thing that my disability keeps me from doing is drive a car. And play any kind of sport where I have to judge distances quickly (bad depth perception). –Cary