[games_access] Information please: Game Designers with Disabilities.

[Franco Eusébio Garcia]

Hello, Ray,

I'll try complementing Eleanor's answer here.

> I now know there are game designers with disabilities.

There really are game designers with disabilities. It might be hard to
search using a general term; however, it is possible to find some of them
by narrowing your search to specific disabilities.
Should you need some more references, I have a few you might find useful:

[1]
<http://n4g.com/news/648398/blind-video-game-programmer-from-puerto-rico-shocks-the-industry-live-footage>
[2]
<http://venturebeat.com/2012/07/22/screenreader-enables-blind-programmer-to-succeed-on-the-app-store-exclusive/>
[3] <http://www.pcsgames.net/dialogue.htm>
[4]
<http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/149350-Disabled-Game-Developer-Is-there-room-for-disabled-devs-in-the-game-industry>
[5] <http://xboxforums.create.msdn.com/forums/p/16574/87443.aspx>

If you are not focusing on digital games only, looking for board game
designers could also be a good idea.
The following are not gaming related, although it could also be
interesting:

[5] <http://homes.cs.washington.edu/~ladner/hahnexperiences.html>
[6]
<http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2013/04/22/177452578/young-adults-with-autism-can-thrive-in-high-tech-jobs>

Another interesting reference could be Sonar, a project aiming to create an
accessible Linux distribution.

[7] <http://sonargnulinux.com/>
[8] <https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/sonar-project>

I do not know if it has programming facilities for developers with
disabilities; however, command line interfaces tend to be more accessible.
At least one of the developers of the project is blind, so there might be.

> So, my second question is what sorts of technology do those designers use
-- and I realize there are many different disabilities, so there's not a
single tool used?

You are indeed right - the tools will vary depending on the disability.
They will also vary depending on the complexity and genre of the game.

The ideal tool would be an accessible game editor - however, unfortunately,
there are not too many options. An interesting one is Adventure Game Engine
[9].
Other than BGS mentioned by Eleanor, there is/was also Blindstation.
Another interesting one could be PlayFic [10], an online site that eases
the creation of text-based adventure games.

[9] <http://blindaudiogames.com/>
[10] <http://playfic.com/>

As for programming itself, many of the tools for programmers with
disabilities are assistive technologies - many of them are the very same
assistive technologies used to interact with the computer. Once again, most
of my references are regarding visual impairments. Unfortnately, there are
not game specific; however, I hope you find some of it useful.
To cite a few:

a) For visually impaired programmers some include screen readers, braille
displays, text to speech converters and screen magnification. The links
should provide further alternatives:

[11]
<https://stackoverflow.com/questions/118984/how-can-you-program-if-youre-blind>

Jaime Sánchez's Audio Programming Language explores another approach. It
might be worth checking.

[12]
http://www.captura.uchile.cl/bitstream/handle/2250/6218/Sanchez_Jaime_APL.pdf?sequence=1

b) For motor impaired programmers, an option is on-screen keyboards and
voice input (also useful for visually impaired).

c) For color blind programmers, many editors or IDEs provide the option to
change syntax highlighting options.

Other than the languages outlined by Eleanor, Lua and Ruby are also popular
languages. The syntax of Lua, for instance, is mostly textual, which eases
the usage of assistive technologies (even commands are text - for instance,
the 'and' operator is 'and' instead of '&&' in languages such as Java and
C++). From the Lua website [13]:

"As a blind programmer, I really enjoy the Lua scripting language. It is
one of the most speech friendly languages to read and write with a screen
reader. Lua is also very fast, light and portable."

[13] http://www.lua.org/quotes.html

Should you have a specific disability in mind, pleask ask. I might have a
more specific reference to share.

Best regards,
Franco
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