[games_access] Australian government encourages studios to consider accessibility

[Ian Hamilton]

Hello!

Some nice news from Australia. In November the government announced $20m of funding for the games industry in the form of grants, with grants of up to $500k available for individual studios.

http://www.kotaku.com.au/2012/11/australian-government-to-invest-20-million-to-local-games-development/

The finalised criteria and application guidelines were published today. They don't quite go as far as Film Victoria's set criteria, but following on from FV's lead (http://igda-gasig.org/2011/10/11/announcement-partnering-with-film-victoria/) the application form for the government grants encourages studios to consider accessibility wherever possible in any funded games.

http://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/documents/SA_publications/Guidelines/Glines_IMP_Games.pdf

It has been Australia leading the way in both cases but that's now a pretty strong template for similar grants / tax breaks in other countries to follow, especially as Film Victoria's accessibility requirements have been successful over the year that they have been running for.

Of course in a similar way to awards, for the many developers who care a bit but for whatever reason not yet quite enough to reflect that in their work, accessibility being associated with funding could well be just the extra little bit of motivation they need to convince them to take the plunge. 

And with something as high profile as this funding application, which no doubt many of the developers in the country will be reading very carefully, it's quite a nice bit of awareness raising too.

Ian 		 	   		  
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