Global Accessibility Awareness Day quotes

Through the course of this year's Global Accessibility Awareness Day there were all kinds of great things said about accessibility in gaming. These are a few of my favourites.

We have alot of customisation options in our closed captioning that i think alot of people wish were in games, and it would be great if games could leverage our closed captioning systems, it would be easier for them, and be better for our customers

- Bryce Johnson, XBox

It's very important that we continue to ask game developers to insert remapping into their games.

- Bryce Johnson, XBox

I would hope that other developers would look to this as an example, and just copy it or improve upon it.

- Alex Neonakis, Naughty Dog

More and more games seem to be widening their audience, and unless we are really making an initiative to include a wider audience as far as controls go, we are just going to be leaving alot of potential customers behind.

- Emilia Schatz, Naughty Dog

The lesson really is that if you think about it and raise awareness it can be done, it just needs to be made something that is part of the design fabric.

- Kevin Chung, Sony

When talking to our exexucutives and people around here about accessibility, people around here want to do the right thing, the right thing by our consumers, by our fans.

- Kevin Chung, Sony

We pride ourselves on being an inclusive community for our gamers, so it's a natural extension that accessibility would be a priority for us a company and for Naughty Dog as a studio.

- Kevin Chung, Sony

I think video games, for a lot of people, are often about being able to do things that you wouldn't normally be able to do, experience great adventures. And so when you find that there are some people who can't enjoy those kind of things, it's kind of crushing.

- Kevin Keeker, Playstation

Games provide a social space where, instead of being judged by phsycial appearance, we're purely judged on the actions that we do and the things that we produce.

- Josh Straub, DAGERS

When I turn on a game like "Uncharted", I'm no longer confined to a wheelchair. I'm a swashbuckling ne-er do well treasure hunter like Nathan Drake. That brief period of escape is why accessibility is so crucial.

- Josh Straub, DAGERS

I went to have the initial pitch on, hey, this is game accessibility, this is why it matters. And everyone was just like, yep, everyone should be able to play our game, that's a good point Tara. And I was like.. well, I had this whole speech prepared about about how much money we can make and why it's good, but you guys are just good people so you'll do it, awesome.

- Tara Voelker, Turtle Rock

It should come really really early on. Accessibility features are not hard to develop, but they are terribly hard to retrofit. If you plan them from the beginning, they are not hard.

- Tara Voelker, Turtle Rock

You should be excited about game accessibility. You should tell everyone how great game accessibility is.

- Tara Voelker, Turtle Rock

Two decades ago, video games saved my life. Thanks to video games, I’ve been able to make friends, experience life, fall in love, and become a part of something greater than myself– something that will last far beyond this disabled body I call home. Everyone deserves to experience virtual worlds where you can run, jump, soar and fly, just like anyone else. 

- Steven Spohn, AbleGamers

Things are certainly improving, but there's a long way to go before you can buy any game and expect the developer to have taking into account at least a basic level of accessibility. That day will come.

- Barrie Ellis, OneSwitch/SpecialEffect

Microsoft deserve a standing ovation (whilst mouthing "don't stop now") for their current attitudes to game accessibility.

- Barrie Ellis, OneSwitch/SpecialEffect

Access to the products of culture is as important as access to to the day to day fundamentals.

- Michael Heron, MeepleLikeUs

#gaad is a great day to remind folk of this great games accessibility resource -  http://gameaccessibilityguidelines.com. As are all days ending in Y.

- Giselle Rosman, Hipster Whale/GDAA

The attitudes from games industry have gone from "who cares" five years ago to today's "how can we help".

- Craig Kaufman, AbleGamers

I've also posted separately with links to the videos, articles and tweets that all of the above quotes came from - Global Accessibility Awareness Day

Reposted from personal blog