Post #10 Designing for Adaptability
The world of special needs is near and dear to my heart. My son, who is almost 29, has been in a wheelchair his whole life due to congenital cerebral palsy. I’ve made a number of modifications to our home to make it easier for him to get around. He has a wheelchair van but doesn’t drive so his friends come and pick him up for church and other outings. He does graphic design for a hobby. We’ve printed a number of t-shirts featuring his designs. All in all, he has a pretty full life.
So, this blog was partly inspired by him and an episode of REPOD with David Spira and Peih Gee Law (S5E7 here) who interviewed Sina Bahram, an accessibility consultant and blind immersive experience participant. Some of the subjects they covered were pretty amazing. Making puzzles and games accessible to everyone not only widens the audience, it also improves the experience for all players. We are already planning to include sound, light and smoke effects in our escape boxes. Our first box, Moriarty’s Mini Mayhem has a letter based puzzle. I’m pretty sure we can get braille tags for the letters, but the hint sheet is printed. Getting it reproduced in Braille may be an option, or having a QR code linked to an audio version may be easier and less costly. And this brings us to another point: The reason more games aren’t designed with disabilities in mind.
A little side note: Our Flagship card game, One Letter Better (more info here) is a spelling card game in which the color of the card determines how it is played. For folks suffering from color blindness, the colors of the cards are spelled out on every card and the color mechanic is also written out.
According to the 202o US Census, 13% of Americans have some sort of disability. Now, generally this will cover the spectrum from ADHD, autism and dyslexia to deafness, blindness and various degrees of all these conditions. So game designers would have to modify their designs, sometimes at a considerable cost for slightly more than ten percent of the American population. For most companies, that market share doesn’t warrant the expense. In our case, we aren’t producing mass market games so it’s a little easier to make the accommodations.
Since we are already planning to have sound in our boxes, it doesn’t take a lot to include a verbal recording of a written clue. It can be automatically played or on demand with a button installed for that purpose. It will help include sight challenged players and still add to the experience for everyone. Will it be more work? Yep. Voiceover recordings, more memory requirements, more programming, etc. Will it be worth it? Hopefully. If even one person is able to participate because of the modification, then the answer is yes. Can we accommodate every possible disability? No. There are a lot of folks who have difficulty with noise, lights and being too close to others. Given the nature of our escape boxes, audible and visual stimuli are integral to the game. But where possible, we can surely try to be as inclusive as our games will allow. And if that includes someone who might otherwise be left out, then yes, it’s worth it.
Have a great day and be nice to someone.