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Game accessibility guidelines

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Support more than one input device

First visit yesterday was a crew of vets to see the new game. Nice young guy asks me if we have controller support and I immediately go into my pre canned response about that we are PC first and that keyboard mouse are pretty easy to learn at which point he holds up his lack of a hand and shrugs as I notice his glass eye and scar on his face.
Cliff Bleszinski, founder, Boss Key

When we got our inbox open, we almost couldn’t believe our eyes; it was just pouring with encouraging emails. For us it was a rather simple thing to implement, but we couldn’t imagine that it could mean so much to somebody else.
Juho Salila, artist, Legend of Grimrock

Different input devices involve different types of motor ability. Some are more suited to gross motor movement, some to fine. Some have complex motor-cognitive metaphors (eg. pushing a mouse away from you to move an on-screen cursor upwards), some are direct. Accessibility specific input devices also map to different mainstream devices, for example accessibility switches map to digital buttons, and eye tracking maps to mouse cursor movement. So there is no more or less accessible input device, different devices work better for different people

Outside of the demands of the input device itself, there are other reasons why people need to use different input devices. For example someone with a fatigue related condition who normally plays with keyboard/mouse but often needs to switch to playing lying down, and so needs to play with a controller instead.

So supporting as many input methods as possible will allow more people to play. For example a choice between controller / mouse&keyboard, d-pad / analogue, tilt / virtual stick, keyboard / mouse, VR motion controls / analogue stick.

Best practice example: The London Heist
Best practice example: Goliath
Best practice example: Stardust Galaxy Warriors
Best practice example: Everybody’s Gone To The Rapture
Best practice example: Legend of Grimrock
Best practice example: Speedball 2 Evolution

All guidelines

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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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