[games_access] XBox One reception on twitter (Barrie Ellis)

[Ian Hamilton]

Switch accessibility on Android isn't wildly different, it's a little easier to develop for than iOS as Komodo do an emulator app for Android that you can test with, and it maps more directly to keyboard input rather than the dodgy VoiceOver hack that you have to rely on in iOS.

The problem with switch on mobile though comes from because mobiles/tablets (well, iOS ones at least) aren't designed ground-up to be controlled using external devices. That means there isn't a simple way of doing switch access, so unlike desktop where everything just maps to a keyboard key, every different switch box has a slightly (or very) different way of working - direct hardware access, internal keyboard mapping, external bluetooth keyboard mapping, mapping to multi-touch voiceover gestures.. 

That means that you don't make something switch-accessible, you make it accessible for a particular switch box on a particular platform. You can't even make something cross-platform that is Komodo-compatible, as Komodo works differently on iOS and Android, and Komodo is just one brand of switch box, there are all the other common devices to cater for too. 

I've had some experience of doing that, it's possible but it is a right pain and completely defeats the point of switch, a far far cry from desktop where all you need to do is listen out for a keyboard key and not care about the tech. The team had a decent amount of past form with desktop switch, but even with that and getting some decent dialogue going with the device manufacturers themselves it was still a bit of a nightmare, as you say I can't imagine anyone with less expertise than that having much chance of getting a broadly compatible solution in place. 

I'm meant to be starting work soon on a similar game that needs to support a wide range of switches on different mobile platforms, but this time with a company who have no previous knowledge of switch accessibility.. that's going to be fun.

But yes, absolutely huge wasted potential when you consider how many phone/tablet games there are that have simple controls that would be perfectly suited to one/two switch.

Totally agree about the 'new shiny' thing, it's the same story with developers in other industries too.  No doubt there'll be lots of silly & design exclusionary decisions made, like pinch-zoom with no button equivalent, but on the plus side the PS4 touchpad doesn't have as many useful practical applications as sixaxis did thanks to the touch being divorced from the screen, no direct manipulation, which removes most of the usefulness of touch interaction. It's like a Wii-U or a Vita with the most useful aspect removed. 

As far as MS's 3rd party peripheral blocks go there are some echoes of that here, hopefully they've learned from something from last time though: http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/05/22/xbox-one-incompatible-with-current-gaming-headsets 

Ian

> 
> Message: 2
> Date: Thu, 23 May 2013 08:28:03 +0100
> From: "Barrie Ellis" <oneswitch at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [games_access] XBox One reception on twitter (Steve
> 	Spohn)
> To: "IGDA Games Accessibility SIG Mailing List"
> 	<games_access at igda.org>
> Message-ID: <B8CEADD899E94E96953484FEABA0A686 at OneSwitchPC>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
> 
> The state of game accessibility worries me a bit at the minute. Especially so re. physical access.
> 
> I like very much what Komodo Open Lab and others have done to make Apple iOS games more accessible... But the fact remains the vast majority of games are impossible to play unless you can touch the screen. And I've never seen a worse platform for games that should be possible to make one-switch accessible, and yet remain out of reach.
> 
> I won't lie, I don't fully understand the Android platform for it's potential accessibility - but it does leave me feeling confused. I wonder how non-experienced Game Accessibility people find it when trying to find access solutions. 
> 
> Sony seem obsessed with making the most complex, jam-packed controller possible. It's sad to me that some of my favourite games on the PS3 remain extremely hard/impossible for me to make accessible for quite a broad portion of the physical disabilities spectrum (Flower and Heavy Rain) due to Six-Axis being forced on the player with no alternative. The new controller looks like a potential nightmare for excluding people who can't cope with the huge array of possibilities - because I'm 99.9% sure that Sony won't give any advice on offering more accessible options for controls. Look at the new shiny thing!
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> Nintendo were utterly short-sighted with the Wii, forcing people to use a controller that requires a high-degree of physical accuracy to just navigate the menu screens - and not asking people to consider those who might not be able to use the Wii-remote. The Wii-U? Seems like an absurd degree of accuracy is needed for that and I see no fixes for it that aren't going to cost a huge amount.
> 
> Microsoft's blocks on 3rd party controllers was highly disabling frankly for the Xbox 360. What a mean minded decision that was, to try to stop people using alternative controls. I think Microsoft redeemed themselves by not trying to take down the adapters that help get around this issue, and ended up allowing a massive range of alternative controls. The Kinect promised so much, so I do remain hopeful for Kinect 2. But as Ian indicated, without some guidance coming from Microsoft to developers I can foresee Xbox One living moving into iOS/Wii territory of there only being a handful of games that think about those who will prefer/need to use an alternative control method - but the majority not giving it a thought. I hope I'm wrong.
> 
> Maybe a carefully worded open letter (more so than above!) might be something we could present to all platform developers with their ever more demanding proprietary control methods. 
> 
> Game accessibility was better in so many ways back in 1982 which seems so wrong to me.
> 
> Barrie
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