[games_access] Information please: Game Designers with Disabilities.

Thu May 8 18:47:05 EDT 2014

That's right! Yeah, during the SIG meeting at GDC 2014 I brought up the
fact that only those had Unity Pro got a "dark" theme to work with in
Unity. I personally think a dark theme should be available to any developer
since some people may find the dark theme easier to work with due to
sensitivity to light or otherwise.

Dan Fischbach, Net+, MCP
W: danfischbach.com P: 609-458-7920
Proud NJIT (BS) and UCF/FIEA (MS) graduate
Please consider the environment before printing this email

On Thu, May 8, 2014 at 6:23 PM, Ian Hamilton <i_h at hotmail.com> wrote:

> Absolutely agree with everything below, particularly the audyssey mailing
> list, there are a decent number of blind game devs on there, and if you're
> talking about online resources I'd imagine that there would be a strong
> focus on vision impairment and screen-reader support.
>
> Bottom line is that, like gaming itself, if people are passionate about
> making games they'll take whatever avenue they can to do so, even if their
> impairment seems to be one that would exclude them from a particular role -
> even yesterday I was speaking to someone from a large studio who's art
> director is fully deuteranopic colourblind.
>
> Dan brought up a nice point at the GDC meeting about Unity, a feature that
> wasn't included in any way for accessibility but that actually opens up use
> of the engine to many more people - the ability to switch the editor to
> different skins, with different levels of glare/contrast.
>
> Ian
>
> ------------------------------
> Date: Thu, 8 May 2014 17:32:01 -0400
> From: blindwolf8 at gmail.com
> To: games_access at igda.org
> Subject: Re: [games_access] Information please: Game Designers with
> Disabilities.
>
>
> Hi Raymond,
> Just wanted to chime in and agree with others: There are game developers
> with disabilities. I myself am legally blind, which means I have some
> sight. If you'd like to chat off-list, feel free to email me (unsure if the
> list will show my full email) and/or call me at the number below.
>
> Thanks Raymond!
>
> Dan Fischbach, Net+, MCP
> W: danfischbach.com P: 609-458-7920
> Proud NJIT (BS) and UCF/FIEA (MS) graduate
> Please consider the environment before printing this email
>
>
> On Thu, May 8, 2014 at 4:50 PM, Franco Eusébio Garcia <
> franco.garcia at dc.ufscar.br> wrote:
>
>  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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