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Game accessibility guidelines

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Offer a wide choice of difficulty levels

I recently showed this game to my brother after I played and finished it for the first time. He really seems interested in it, but he’s disabled. I got it worked out where he can use a console controller to play the game, but the game’s difficulty will really kill his experience.
CeliceTheGreat, via GameFAQs

Offering a simple choice of difficulty is a fairly blunt but still good first step in accessibility, allowing some flexibility in the main challenge involved, such as level of AI, speed of enemies or difficulty of puzzles. This can be taken further by offering more detailed options for individual elements of game difficulty.

Allow as wide a choice as possible, at both ends of the scale, and avoid giving demeaning names for lower levels or or mocking players who use them. Bear in mind that difficulty is about allowing people with different levels of ability the same level of experience, even the easiest setting you can possibly implement will present a significant challenge for some.

Best practice example: Silent Hill 2
Best practice example: Starcraft II
Best practice example: Guilty Gear Xrd Revelator

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Help & advice

How to work with these guidelines

FCC Chairman's Award for Advancement in Accessibility
finalist 2016, tiga games industry awards
DFA foundation best practice award, Horizon Interactive Bronze Winner, 7-128 industry & community leader

About the guidelines

A collaborative effort between a group of studios, specialists and academics, to produce a straightforward developer friendly reference for ways to avoid unnecessarily excluding players, and ensure that games are just as fun for as wide a range of people as possible.

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