[games_access] Question concerning making force feedback accessible?

[Reid Kimball]

I think a developer should represent feedback when it's necessary.
Currently force feedback isn't the focus of games, except for haptic
devices like Novint. Usually in the games I work on, force feedback
supplements already existing feedback, such as sounds and animation.
Then it becomes a task to make sure the sounds are converted into
other media and animations are easily seen for low-vision players.

Otherwise, you may see redundant feedback, such as:

(DISTANT EXPLOSION) for a sound caption
(SOFT EXPLOSION RUMBLE) for the force feedback

-Reid

On Dec 17, 2007 12:26 PM, AudioGames.net <richard at audiogames.net> wrote:
>
>
> Hi,
>
> I'm busy making a diagram of how to map one medium to another medium, for
> instance the path from auditory information to a text description of this
> auditory information in the form of a closed caption. I was
> enthousiastically drawing a path for adapting force-feedback information to
> other media like sound and visuals when it dawned on me: does this
> information need to be adapted to other media?
>
> On one hand I'd say yes, if it communicates important information which is
> not communicated by the game through other means and thus not available when
> force feedback cannot be perceived (for instance because the player uses
> output hardware that do not support force feedback). But I was thinking of
> examples of this and couldn't think of any. Does anyone have an example of
> where force feedback is used to communicate important information that is
> not communicated via other means (like sound or visuals) by the game?
>
> Also: do you think it is important to consider making force feedback
> information accessible by adapting it to different media, even though it
> might not be used much? Or would you simply say to game designers: "Do not
> communicate important information through force feedback ONLY, but also add
> an alternative"?
>
> Greets,
>
> Richard
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