Accessibility

Who can play our games?

Some players can't tell red from green. Some play with the sound off, or can't hear it. Some can only use one hand comfortably. For some, fast flashing lights are painful or even dangerous. The World Health Organization estimates that about 1 in 6 people worldwide lives with a significant disability.

Accessibility means designing a game so as many people as possible can play and enjoy it. Every option we add opens the game to more players.

Don't rely on colour alone

About 1 in 12 boys and men, and about 1 in 200 girls and women, have some kind of colour blindness. Red and green are the pair most often mixed up.

So never let colour be the only clue. Add a second one: a different shape, an icon, a pattern or a label.

A quick test: look at a screenshot in black and white. If you can still tell everything apart, you are in good shape.

Subtitles and captions

Subtitles show the words characters say. Captions also describe important sounds, like [warning beep] or [boss roars]. They help players who are deaf or hard of hearing, and anyone playing with the sound off.

Good subtitles are on by default, big enough to read, show who is speaking, and sit on a dark box so they stay readable over bright explosions.

The same goes for gameplay: if a warning only exists as a sound, add something to see, like an arrow at the screen edge pointing at the beetle.

Controls and difficulty options

• Remappable controlsPlayers choose which button or key does what. This helps left-handed players and people using special controllers.
• Hold or toggleHolding a button for a long time is hard for some people. A toggle lets one press start an action and another stop it.
• Assist optionsA slower game speed, a longer input buffer or an extra shield, for players who need more time to react.
• Difficulty choicesEasy, normal and hard waves, so new players and experts both get a fair challenge.

Text people can read

Garden Defense runs on phones, and phone screens are small. Coin counts, plant costs and wave numbers must be readable at arm's length.

Designers measure contrast, how different text is from its background, as a ratio. Black on white is 21 to 1, the most possible. The web's accessibility guidelines ask for at least 4.5 to 1 for normal text, and free contrast checkers online will tell you the number. Best of all, add a setting that makes text larger.

Flashing effects

Fast flashing, especially more than three flashes in one second, can trigger seizures in people with photosensitive epilepsy. In 1997, flashing lights in one episode of a Pokémon cartoon sent hundreds of children in Japan to hospital.

So Hyper Shards shows a short warning at the start, and its settings can reduce flashing and screen shake. The effects (designers call them juice) stay on for everyone who wants them.

Bolt says: Phones and computers have a "reduce motion" setting, and web pages can read it with the CSS rule prefers-reduced-motion. Superintelligent Game Studios does: if your device asks for reduced motion, this site turns its animations off.

Good for everyone

Ramps cut into pavements were made for wheelchairs, but they also help people with prams, suitcases and bikes. Game options work the same way. Subtitles help in noisy rooms. Bigger text helps on small phones. Remapping helps anyone with a favourite layout.

The Last of Us Part II (2020) launched with over 60 accessibility options and showed big studios what is possible. Planning options early is much easier than adding them at the end.

Bolt says: Next lesson: screen readers, and how blind and low-vision players play games.