Accessibility highlights of 2016

By Thomas Westin, IGDA-GASIG co-chair

2016 has been a hugely significant year for accessibility in game development. The following is a compilation of articles, news stories and advances from throughout the year. Many are news stories shared on the IGDA Game Accessibility SIG’s mailing list, but there are also others included from other sources.

This is not an exhaustive list, but it should give a sense of the ever increasing pace at which accessibility in the games industry is advancing.

JANUARY

Global Game Jam, which had several optional accessibility challenges, taken up by thousands of developers: http://globalgamejam.org/news/ggj16-diversifiers-are

Rocket League and MLB: The Show win AbleGamers game of the year awards
https://web.archive.org/web/20160502003424/http://www.ablegamers.com/announcing-the-ablegamers-2015-accessible-game-of-the-year/

FEBRUARY

Gamecritics.com now includes info on controller options and whether the game relies on colour, in addition to audio access:
www.gamecritics.com/brad-gallaway/gamecritics-reviews-enhanced-information-on-accessibility

A demo walking through how blind gamer SightlessKombat plays Killer Instinct using audio cues and stereo separation alone, and some discussion of how community effort led to some blind-accessibility features making their way into the game:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=THbVXGulDUE

AbleGamers interview with another blind Killer Instinct player, Xavier Quintero:
 http://www.unstoppablegamer.com/killer-instinct-and-accessibility-interview-with-xavier-quintero/

Heroes Of The Storm win D.A.G.E.R.S. diamond award:
http://dagersystem.com/2015-diamond-award-winner/

SpecialEffect’s new games room facility opened by a cross-party parliamentary delegation, including the UK Prime Minister
http://www.specialeffect.org.uk/specialeffect-news/david-cameron-officially-opens-our-games-room

MARCH

Record number of accessibility talks at at GDC 2016:
https://www.reddit.com/r/disabledgamers/comments/432m11/gdc_2016_conference/

Chad Johnson managed the GASIG roundtable at GDC:
https://igda-gasig.org/2016/04/19/ga-sig-roundtable-meeting-notes-gdc-16/

Record number of game accessibility sessions at CSUN 2016:
https://www.reddit.com/r/disabledgamers/comments/42qsp1/csun_2016_conference/

Article on VR accessibility by Katie Goode:
http://www.triangularpixels.net/cms/development/vr-games-for-all-designing-unseen-diplomacy-for-disabled-users/

APRIL

Sony employee builds a custom PS4 controller for a gamer with cerebral palsy:
http://www.engadget.com/2016/04/04/ps4-controller-for-cerebral-palsy-gamer/

IGDA-GASIG panel at Microsoft’s Ability Summit.

Unity announce development of new input model, including engine-level remapping functionality:
https://blogs.unity3d.com/2016/04/12/developing-the-new-input-system-together-with-you/

GDC sessions up on GDC vault, with most of the accessibility ones freely available without subscription. Great selection of topics and record attendance too, average of around 120 people per session:
http://ian-hamilton.com/gdc16s-accessibility-sessions/

UKIE Student Game Jam, which had accessibility advice and an accessibility award:
http://ukie.org.uk/content/brunel-university-announced-winners-2016-ukie-student-game-jam

One Click Jam, one button themed game jam held in various physical venues around South America:
http://www.oneclickjam.org/es

MAY

Overwatch and Uncharted 4 released, two of the biggest games of the year and both with a range of accessibility considerations, such as Overwatch’s sound design and per-class remapping, and Uncharted 4’s wide range of motor accessibility features:
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2016-05-25-overwatch-fan-with-cerebal-palsy-thanks-blizzard-for-custom-controls
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ls_CD4mB42s

One-handed Mode for Google Keyboard: http://thenextweb.com/apps/2016/05/03/googles-stock-keyboard-now-one-handed-mode/#gref”

24 hours of free online accessibility talks for Global Accessibility Awareness Day, including three on accessibility in gaming:
http://www.inclusivedesign24.org

Microsoft announce their ‘gaming for everyone’ initiative at E3, which includes commitments to accessibility:
http://news.microsoft.com/gamingforeveryone/

Accessibility interview with the developers of EVE online, including a request for public accessibility input:
https://www.themittani.com/columns/access-granted-accessibility-ui-interview-ccp-surge-part-1
https://www.themittani.com/columns/access-granted-accessibility-ui-interview-ccp-surge-part-2

Phil Spencer, head of Xbox congratulates Naughty Dog on their accessibility efforts in PlayStation exclusive Uncharted 4:
https://twitter.com/XboxP3/status/733701149916680192

AbleGamers invited to the White House:
https://twitter.com/AbleGamers/status/727492947357392896

JUNE

Ian Hamilton’s Gamasutra blog post on highlights from the previous month:
http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/IanHamilton/20160620/275289/An_exciting_month_in_accessibility.php

Phil Spencer at Microsoft says: “We believe gaming should be fun for everyone”
http://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2016/06/13/gaming-for-everyone/#sm.0008b6cvy1a1ndkdy092b7jnzhwsr

Madden 17’s accessibility featureset for impaired vision announced:
https://www.easports.com/madden-nfl/news/2016/madden-17-accessibility

Karen Stevens of the Madden 17 team sets up twitter account and email address for public accessibility feedback across all EA games:
https://twitter.com/ea_accessible/status/741696820196343808

Final Fantasy XV wait mode announced:
https://twitter.com/FFXVEN/status/742846836386332672

AJ Ryan chosen as first recipient of AbleGamers Fellowship
http://www.trionworlds.com/en/news/2016/06/introducing-the-winner-of-the-ablegamers-fellowship-2016-alex-james-ryan/

The Great Steampunk Game Jam, which had accessibility advice and an accessibility award:
http://blog.nationalarchives.gov.uk/blog/great-steampunk-game-jam/

Cliff Bleszinski shares veteran encounter story:
https://twitter.com/therealcliffyb/status/744232111079571456

JULY

Surviving and thriving as a game developer with chronic illness:
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/277037/Surviving_and_thriving_as_a_game_developer_with_chronic_illness.php

Xbox confirm wheelchair avatars are in development:
http://www.theverge.com/2016/7/5/12095890/microsoft-wheelchair-xbox-avatars

Launch of Pokemon Go, inspiring a huge amount of accessibility discussion not only amongst gamers but also disability organisation that had not previously taken an interest in gaming, for example:
http://www.afb.org/slide/pokemon-go-accessibility
https://www.abilitynet.org.uk/news-blogs/pok%C3%A9mon-go-are-incense-and-street-view-key-more-inclusivity-disabled-people

Article on VR accessibility by Brian Van Buren:
http://www.vrinflux.com/vr-accessibility-why-changing-head-height-matters/

7128 top sites awards:
http://www.7128.com/top25/topsiteslists.html

First iteration of a Game Accessibility Curriculum Framework was presented and published at ICCHP 2016, Linz, Austria
http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-41264-1_68

AUGUST

Demonstration of Pokemon Go running with a single accessibility switch:
https://techcrunch.com/2016/08/05/teclas-tech-makes-pokemon-go-more-accessible-for-wheelchair-users/

One Button Jam, nearly 160 entries:
https://itch.io/jam/one-button-to-rule-all-jam#entries

Audiogame Jam, the best of which were showcased at Techshare:
http://jams.gamejolt.io/AGJam

Valve announce royalty free licencing for the lighthouse technology used in the HTC vive, opening up a path to accessible alternative controllers:
http://www.roadtovr.com/valve-third-party-lighthouse-api-steamvr-tracking-htc-vive-dev-kit-license-royalty/

Twitch partnership with Ablegamers, including a week of disabled streamers featuring on the Twitch homepage and a trial of new live captioning functionality:
http://kotaku.com/twitch-will-highlight-disabled-gamers-this-week-1785591255

Launch of Hue, which gained large amounts of media coverage of its colorblind support, simply through mentioning it in the game’s presskit:
http://blog.us.playstation.com/2016/08/03/vibrant-puzzler-hue-coming-soon-to-ps4-ps-vita/

Household Games hires Clint ‘halfcoordinated’ Lexa as an accessibility specialist
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/279775/Household_Games_hires_speedrunner_as_accessibility_advocate.php

SEPTEMBER

Apple add ‘hold at point’ functionality to switch recipes, making a huge range of iOS games compatible with accessibility switches:
http://switchgaming.blogspot.com.es/2016/09/ios-10-hold-at-point-aka-momentary.html

Microsoft publish high level guidance on game accessibility:
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/uwp/gaming/accessibility-for-games

IGDA-GASIG Game Accessibility Conference announced for Feb 27^th 2017!
http://www.gaconf.com/

Seattle VR Hackathon, which had accessibility specialists present and an accessibility mentor:
http://vrhackathon.com/seattle.html

WAG workshop on game accessibility:
http://cedric.cnam.fr/~dupirej/IFIP-WG14.9/WAG.html

Warlock of Firetop Mountain launch, a text heavy game with a rarely seen number of reading accessibility features – wide range of text sizes, choice of font, and configurable line spacing
https://twitter.com/ianhamilton_/status/803185284758310914

Bosskey publish game accessibility survey to inform future development:
https://twitter.com/therealcliffyb/status/780429207717474304

Talk by Tom Lorusso of Microsoft on research carried out with deaf/hard of hearing gamers:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0_3G-YSWRo

Second iteration of the Game Accessibility Curriculum Framework was presented and published at ICEC 2016, Vienna, Austria.
http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-46100-7_20

OCTOBER

PSVR launch, with nearly all launch games offering a choice between motion input and controller input.

XX Jam, which had accessibility advice:
https://grrrlgames.wordpress.com/2016/09/04/announcing-the-xx-games-jam/

NOVEMBER

Nice talk from Brian Van Buren about VR accessibility:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=how99N0Pvj8

Ian Hamilton’s Gamasutra blog post also about VR accessibility:
http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/IanHamilton/20161031/284491/VR__accessibility.php

And a great panel dedicated to accessibility from VRDC:
http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1023932/For-Every-Gamer-Making-VR

AbleGamers aquires Get Well Gamers Foundation:
http://www.ablegamers.com/get-well-gamers/

Tangent wins the accessibility category of the Australian Game Developer awards:
http://www.kotaku.com.au/2016/11/here-are-the-winners-of-the-2016-australian-game-developers-awards/

Final Fantasy 15 includes accessibility section in game manual:
https://mobile.twitter.com/cherryrae/status/804166787415744513

Karen Stevens shares preview of EA internal accessibility reporting website:
https://mobile.twitter.com/ea_accessible/status/799049997262196736

Sony host a livestreamed accessibility panel at PlayStation Experience, including strong commitments to accessibility from Shawn Layden, head of Sony Worldwide Studios:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5gslH30CTao

LSBU’s Enable Gaming accessibility education wins TIGA award
http://www.lsbu.ac.uk/about-us/news/winners-tiga-awards

DECEMBER

Full CSUN lineup announced, including a record breaking eight accessibility talks:
https://www.reddit.com/r/disabledgamers/comments/5ktf7b/game_accessibility_at_csun/

Steam announce full remapping support for PS4 controllers:
http://www.unstoppablegamer.com/valve-supports-for-ps4-controller-opens-steam-to-more-accessibility/

Accessibility game jam in Poland:
http://rudydziobak.com/accessibility-game-jam-part-1/

Japan/Netherlands accessibility game jam:
https://twitter.com/gerritsen_marc/status/808650854655893504

Failbetter publish game accessibility survey to inform future development:
https://twitter.com/failbettergames/status/809384907583684609

FCC grant games software a further one year waiver from CVAA regulation:
http://transition.fcc.gov/Daily_Releases/Daily_Business/2016/db1223/DA-16-1449A1.pdf

Favourite quotes from the year:
http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/IanHamilton/20161230/288519/

Research about game accessibility is also going forward in general. A search in Google Scholar on ”game accessibility” (exact phrase) during 2016 shows 74 results (excluding patents and quotes). A caveat is that this search also includes books and some articles may not be peer-reviewed.
https://goo.gl/C09cqL

Again the above post isn’t an exhaustive list, but even what’s here clearly shows a very exciting time for game accessibility, and 2017 is already shaping up to be even greater again.

/Thomas Westin (co-chair), and Ian Hamilton (member), IGDA GA-SIG

Reposted from IGDA-GASIG website