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'to a T' is a coming-of-age game about a T-posing teenager
In to a T, players have to navigate the world as a teenager who can't lower their arms from an outstretched, T-shaped position.
The terrible, fantastic life of AbleGamers COO Steven Spohn
When Twitch streamer DrDisrespect won the Trending Gamer prize at the 2017 Game Awards, there was a tiny riot on Twitter. There's always a buzz of hashtag activity after a winner is announced as people congratulate or disagree with the pick, but this time around, there was a small yet clear consensus: Steven Spohn should have won. As the Chief Operating Officer of AbleGamers, a charity working to make video games more accessible to people with disabilities, Spohn was the face of positive change in the industry. He regularly shared insightful affirmations on Twitter, as well as deeply personal stories about the realities of living with Spinal Muscular Atrophy, a disease that was progressively destroying his motor neurons and muscles. Meanwhile, DrDisrespect was best known for wearing a mullet wig and mocking his teammates with racist accents in Fortnite streams.
Adapter turns power wheelchairs into Xbox controllers
The Xbox Adaptive Controller already makes gaming more accessible if you're in a wheelchair, but wouldn't it be better if you could use the wheelchair itself as a controller? You can now. AbleGamers Charity has unveiled a Freedom Wing Adapter that lets you use the joystick on a power wheelchair as an Xbox One controller. The design revolves around the combination of an adapter board and an Adafruit Feather M4 that translates the input from the joystick into commands the Adaptive Controller can understand.
Engadget at E3: Making virtual reality accessible for everyone
Virtual reality is changing gaming. If it works for you, that is. The technology adds a wearable component to gaming input, and this brings new (occasionally insurmountable) challenges to gamers with disabilities. Amy Kneepkens, head video creator at AbleGamers, joined us onstage at E3 2017 to give us a view into accessibility issues affecting virtual reality.
Indie devs with disabilities win full ride on Train Jam to GDC
Two game developers with disabilities are headed to the 31st annual Game Developers Conference (GDC) this year via Train Jam, a four-day rail excursion from Chicago to San Francisco that was founded in 2013. Train Jam participants collaborate to create new games during the trip, which they can debut at GDC. Both developers are being sponsored by the AbleGamers Foundation, a nonprofit that provides access to video games for people with disabilities via assistive technologies like adapted controllers.
Xbox Elite controller opens up games to people with disabilities
AbleGamers program director Craig Kaufman knows he's done his job when a kid comes running up to him on a busy convention show floor and screams, "I can stab people now!" "And I'm like, you shouldn't yell that in public -- but it's exciting," Kaufman says. "All the kid wanted to do was stab people and we helped him." Kaufman is talking about stabbing people in Call of Duty, not real life. The AbleGamers Charity's core mission is to open up gaming to people with disabilities, which often means giving away specialized controllers that respond to breathing, can be mounted on wheelchairs, or offer single-click solutions for more complicated actions like using analog sticks. However, AbleGamers is always looking for simpler and more accessible options, and this year they found one: the $150 Xbox Elite controller.
Weeklong Twitch marathon showcases streamers with disabilities
The AbleGamers Charity has been campaigning for greater accessibility in games for over a decade now, applauding games that do inclusivity right and raising money for grants and fellowships. Today they're kicking off a different awareness project: A Twitch marathon. Six different streamers will broadcast over the next five days, each showcasing how they play to accommodate their disabilities.
AbleGamers names the top AAA, indie games of 2014
The AbleGamers Foundation, an organization that advocates on behalf of the gaming disability community, has picked Bayonetta 2 as the most accessible mainstream game of 2014, while Always Sometimes Monsters and This War of Mine are the organization's first-ever winners in the new independent game category. Bayonetta 2 receives the AbleGamers' Accessible Mainstream Game of the Year award because it is a "near-perfect example of game accessibility" that allows players to choose from a multitude of control options, AbleGamers says in a press release. "Bayonetta 2 stands out among other accessible mainstream games by paying careful attention to user-friendly game experience," the release reads. "The inclusion of a one-button combat mode creates an experience other character-action titles should implement. As a proof of concept, this game demonstrates that accessibility can be implemented into a mainstream AAA game without harming any of the gameplay. Popular titles such as Shadow of Mordor could easily implement one-button mode for those who need such accessibility while leaving complicated controls for those who prefer those methods, and still award players with a top-notch game that is accessible to everyone." We also thought Bayonetta 2 was an outstanding game of 2014. AbleGamers says it could not choose between Vagabond Dog's Always Sometimes Monsters – a game that we also adored – and 11 Bit's This War of Mine when selecting the inaugural AbleGamers Accessible Mainstream Indie Game of the Year.
Humble Bundle milestones: $50M to charity, $100M to devs
Humble Bundle has raised more than $50 million for charity since launching its first sale in May 2010 – the Humble Indie Bundle, as it was called back then. That bundle introduced the idea of "pay what you want" pricing and offered customers power over the allocation of their payments, plus the chance to do something good for charity. Specifically for that first promotion, it was the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Child's Play Charity. "When my co-founder Jeff [Rosen] first contacted the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Child's Play for our first promotion, no one knew who we were," Humble co-founder John Graham tells Joystiq. "After pitching the confusing idea, in probably too much detail, he was cut off: 'So let me get this straight, you are basically asking if you can give us money? Sure!'" Humble Bundle now supports a roster of more than 50 charitable organizations and has expanded with weekly bundles, ebook bundles, mobile bundles and the Humble Store, which by itself raised $1 million for charity by June 2014. That very first Humble Bundle raised roughly $400,000 for charity – $200,000 each for EFF and Child's Play – at the time an "incomprehensible" amount to John Graham. "It produced a lot of pressure to keep going," he says. "Our potential to raise another $400,000 for charity felt like a moral obligation. Raising more than two orders of magnitude beyond that goal was not something we ever considered."
One-button Bayonetta: Disabled gamers fight for inclusion
Last year, former games journalist Adam Sessler confessed that for the first time his age kept him from being able to play a game that he needed to complete for his job. It's a sobering reminder that we all have limits. Those often come in different forms, but nobody can do everything. Fundamentally, games are about challenge and require some form of conflict to be compelling. That challenge can come in a huge variety of forms, from puzzles to fighting game combos, but the player is always the core component to completing these assignments. Many challenges, however, can prove impossible for some players. In the past few years, video games have grown, trying to adapt themselves to suit larger and broader audiences. Despite this growth, a segment of would-be gamers continue to be effectively locked out by constraints like color blindness or physical ability. Some dedicated groups have been looking to change that, however; and the work they are doing might just open the floodgates for everyone else.
AbleGamers announces 2013 Accessibility Award winners
The AbleGamers Foundation announced the winners of its 2013 Accessibility Awards, highlighting industry achievements and notable progress toward the group's goal of ensuring gameplay accessibility for players with disabilities. AbleGamers named Square Enix's Final Fantasy 14: A Realm Reborn as its Accessible Mainstream Game of the Year, finding that the MMORPG approached "almost every area of accessibility with high standards and practical application." Final Fantasy 14 scored a 9.1 out of 10 in AbleGamers' accessibility review, with players reporting that the game was well-suited for one-handed play and sufficiently playable for those with hearing or vision impairments. AbleGamers additionally honored Galactic Cafe's The Stanley Parable as its Best Accessible Indie Game of the Year, and named the foot-controlled StinkyBoard accessory as its Best New Device or Peripheral. The full list of award recipients is available at the AbleGamers website.
AbleGamers names Final Fantasy XIV accessible mainstream game of the year
AbleGamers is the "largest community of gamers with disabilities on the web,"along with being a non-profit organization that works to help folks with disabilities enjoy video games. AbleGamers reviews games as they come out, but not in the traditional way. Instead, games are rated based on their accessibility and the options available to disabled gamers who may need to customize their gaming experiences. This year, Square Enix's Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn has taken top honors as AbleGamers's accessible mainstream game of 2013. The organization cited FFIXV's customizable control scheme, adjustable UI elements, and use of text-based story text that moves at the player's pace as strengths for gamers playing with disabilities. Producer and director Naoki Yoshida accepted the award, taking a moment to highlight the Square Enix team's work toward making the game accessible and stating, "I would like to formally express my gratitude to AbleGamers for recognizing our efforts."
AbleGamers Foundation raised over $100k in 2013
The AbleGamers Foundation, a nonprofit charity that helps makes gaming accessible for those with disabilities, raised more than $100,000 in 2013. AbleGamers told GamePolitics that the funds were gathered during events like Minethon and PAX East and were pooled with donations from businesses and livestreamers. In a look toward what's to come, AbleGamers COO and Outreach Chair Steve Spohn said the foundation has "really cool projects coming up this year." These will include partnerships, launching new technology, establishing new facilities for caretakers and other efforts to be unveiled in 2014. In addition to funding those projects, donations made in 2014 will help support AbleGamers' year-round grant program, which involved the Summer of Fun grant last June. You can find more information about AbleGamers' cause at its website, including examples of what your donations would make possible.
AbleGamers opens lab to 'enable disabled gamers'
The AbleGamers Charity has opened its first AbleGamers Lab in its West Virginia headquarters. Featuring "top-end gaming devices and cutting-edge assistive technology," the Lab's goal is to offer the disabled the same sort of gaming experiences that more able-bodied players take for granted. "This day has been nearly a decade in the making," said Mark Barlet, founder and director of the AbleGamers Charity. "And up until this point, the AbleGamers Lab has only been a dream." "But I'm proud to announce that this dream has become a reality," added Bartlet. "We already have our first appointment scheduled and will continue consulting with special needs gamers as quickly as we can. It is, has been, and will always be our primary goal to empower and enable any gamer with disabilities to play video games." Bartlet's goal seems to be popular among gamers themselves, as AbleGamers cites the generosity of the gaming industry as the key reason why this Lab now exists. "We have had a tremendous outpouring of generosity from the video game industry and community over the last year. These amazing donors have enabled us to begin consulting with gamers one-on-one to figure out the exact equipment each individual needs to get back into the game," stated AbleGamers COO and Outreach Chair Steve Spohn. The AbleGamers Lab is currently accepting appointments for consultation. For more information or to set up your own visit to the Lab, send an e-mail to AbleGamers' team of assistive technology specialists.
AbleGamers summer grants offer funds for assistive gaming tech
AbleGamers and Minicore Studios, the developer of coming space-dog adventure game Laika Believes, are teaming up to offer grants to purchase assistive gaming technology to players with disabilities. The program is called the "AbleGamers 2013 Summer of Fun Grant Program," and it's open to people of all ages. Take a look at the grant application here. The application will be live until July 31; after that, the AbleGamers board will review the submissions and dole out funding as they see fit. AbleGamers Founder Mark Barlet says he expects to receive thousands of requests, Game Politics reports. Minicore Studios founder John Warren says it's an honor to be involved in the grant program. "Minicore is a huge supporter of the AbleGamers charity," he says. "We love what they do for the gaming community and those with disabilities. This was a perfect opportunity to get involved and help gamers with disabilities play."
Ask Massively: Trailers, emulators, and 'skill caps'
It's time for a grab bag edition of Ask Massively! A reader named Nicholas is up first: I was wondering if you could help me remember a game studio that was developing a new Korean action- MMORPG game engine (and it wasn't Bless, Blade and Soul, or ArcheAge). In the tech demo, no environment was being shown; it focused on the combat aspect of the engine. All the combat took place against a white background, and it was combo-based and reactive to hits. I remember a slow motion scene with an NPC being punched in the face and the face distorting. At the time, there were no announced games using the engine; the video was just showing what tech the game studio had developed. If it helps any, I remember the comments saying that the engine was just going to be vaporware. I think we might! Massively's Lis pegged it as NetEase's Dragon Sword trailer. +1 to Lis.
FIFA 13 is AbleGamers' 'Accessible Mainstream Game of the Year'
The AbleGamers Foundation continues to spearhead the charge for greater accessibility in modern game design, and just as it did last year, the organization has taken it upon itself to determine which mainstream game released in 2012 offered the most helpful features for gamers with physical and/or mental disabilities. Surprisingly, EA Sports' FIFA 13 has earned the honor of being 2012's Accessible Mainstream Game of the Year. "For disabled gamers with Muscular Dystrophy, Cerebral Palsy, Multiple Sclerosis, and even one-handed gamers," the announcement reads, "the ability to play such a sophisticated sports game with simple controls that can be handled by a trackball or mouse mean gamers who may not have been able to enjoy iconic sporting activities like baseball, football, hockey or soccer can now take part in the fun."AbleGamers also appreciated the game's color customization abilities and clearly presented, easily navigated menus, but was most impressed, however, by how deeply FIFA 13's AI can be altered. "The entire game can be slowed down. The computer can be set to perform slower and with less efficiency. Player controlled avatars can utilize additional speed, accuracy and shot power. For those with cognitive disorders and motor impairments, the ability to set the game to an acceptable rate of speed enables those with even the most severe of disabilities."
AbleGamers Foundation to open first permanent 'Accessibility Arcade'
The AbleGamers Foundation will be opening its first permanent arcade installation designed for people with disabilities on Wednesday, October 10, at the Washington D.C. public library's main MLK branch. While the arcade concept has been shown off previously as a limited-time installation, this will new version will be a permanent addition to the library."We're looking forward to welcoming new and experienced gamers with disabilities of all ages to the library for a unique experience," said DC Public Library Adaptive Services Division chief Venetia Demson in a press release available after the break. "When properly used, video games can be an important learning tool for literacy, spatial reasoning and curriculum support as well as a wonderful social experience."Information regarding the specific games and/or assistive technologies that will be available at the arcade was not provided, though anyone interested in the arcade (or the accessible gaming movement as a whole) is encouraged to attend the ribbon-cutting ceremony scheduled for noon local time that Wednesday.
AbleGamers creates how-to accessibility guide for devs, publishers
The AbleGamers Foundation has created a 48-page document it hopes will serve as a how-to guide for game developers and publishers on how to create more accessible games. The in-depth guide by the disability non-profit covers in great detail how to make games available to those with varying degrees of mobility, hearing, visual and cognitive issues."We are gamers first. To us that means that the core of the game should never be changed or altered in any way," AbleGamers Foundation president and founder Mark Barlet told Joystiq. "Our mission has been and always will be to include as many accessibility options for those who need them that are also invisible to those who don't."Some of those "invisible" ideas include being cognizant of color-based game mechanics for the 10 percent of males who are color-blind and offering different levels of visual feedback for those with hearing impairments."Developers could harness more than 33 million gamers if they were to look at these guidelines and incorporate even half of them," Barlet said regarding the economics at play with accessibility. "So far we have been largely successful, but we still need to convince publishers the almighty dollar is just waiting for them from gamers with disabilities if they would only pay attention to accessibility."Grab a copy of the document here: Includification [PDF]
SWTOR receives AbleGamers' Accessible Mainstream GOTY award
The AbleGamers Foundation, an organization focused on providing disabled peoples with information and technology that allows them to more easily enjoy video games, has awarded Star Wars: The Old Republic its 2011 Accessible Mainstream Game of the Year Award for launching with "colorblind friendly options, full subtitles, and control options to let those with mobility impairments play the game as easy as possible.""BioWare did a wonderful job including a large number of options right at launch with the promise of including more as soon as possible," said AbleGamers Foundation president Mark Barlet. "It's very rare to see a game of this caliber initially released with so many accessibility options." The Old Republic is actually BioWare's second title to receive this award; Dragon Age: Origins was dubbed Accessible Mainstream GOTY 2009.
