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Just want to mention something, I am not demanding so feel free to ignore me, if you make a game (and do it because you want to make the game and not to learn s

Just want to mention something, I am not demanding so feel free to ignore me, if you make a game (and do it because you want to make the game and not to learn some language/framework/CV padding) then keep in mind that existing game engines are probably more accessible then something you try to re-invent(especially with text based games). I admit I am a bit upset that when I see some people asking what good game engine for say a text adventure or virtual novel should he use I see people promoting their incomplete, buggy, unsupported engine(and most of the time the single feature is that is using the CoolLanguage)

jhare 6y ago
Do you have a couple accessibility experiences from engines you thought were good? Maybe not "compare" to avoid flame wars, but maybe some highlights.
- simion314 6y ago
  Yes, so I am happy when I see a game engine uses renpy https://www.renpy.org https://www.renpy.org because this engine has a built-in TTS, some of the time the developers did not test their game with this feature but since it uses python the user can hijack the TTS and use regex to cleanup stuff and I also pipe the TTS through my own configured TTS. I see people re-implementing their own visual novel game using Unity, the result is an inferior experience in all possible ways(not only accessibility). Latest RPG Maker can export the game as html/JS , I think people created plugins for TTS but I personally wrote my own hack code that I inject in the game and pip[e the text again into my own configuration. There are other HTML based game engines for text based games, those are also good for accessibility because you can use your existing tools to speack the text or you can change the fonts if that helps. For DirectX/OpenGl games I tried using OCR , this is slow and it also has big problems if the game uses "fantastic" fonts = fonts that look like handwriting or other iregular fonts. Maybe when I will have more time I could learn how to inject code in Unity or Unreal games and attempt to detect when the code renders fonts and pipe the text out of the game.
tarboreus 6y ago
One big gaming disappointment for me as a low vision gamer is Inkle. It's all mostly text based and yet they manage to make their games 100% inaccessible. I think Inform 7 is a good example of a very accessible text engine. Twine is pretty accessible in some contexts / exports, but not in others,unless things have changed recently. Chioce of Games is also notably accessible, kudos to them.
matheusmoreira 6y ago
How does a video game engine add support for accessibility? Is there some kind of interface they have to implement?
- simion314 6y ago
  From my experience as a gamer and not game developer . what a game engine can do is to add support for text to speech TTS for menus , popup messages and in game dialog. This engines will allow you to enable TTS support, and would make it easy for users to change the font sizes for example. I am not sure if there is a cross platform TTS interface. My initial point was that if you want to make a game and not some hobby project try using existing engines, I have nothing against hobby projects I am also considering experimenting with a game that would simulate a world using Prolog , but this would be a toy/experiment.

jhare 6y ago

Do you have a couple accessibility experiences from engines you thought were good? Maybe not "compare" to avoid flame wars, but maybe some highlights.

simion314 6y ago
Yes, so I am happy when I see a game engine uses renpy https://www.renpy.org https://www.renpy.org because this engine has a built-in TTS, some of the time the developers did not test their game with this feature but since it uses python the user can hijack the TTS and use regex to cleanup stuff and I also pipe the TTS through my own configured TTS. I see people re-implementing their own visual novel game using Unity, the result is an inferior experience in all possible ways(not only accessibility). Latest RPG Maker can export the game as html/JS , I think people created plugins for TTS but I personally wrote my own hack code that I inject in the game and pip[e the text again into my own configuration. There are other HTML based game engines for text based games, those are also good for accessibility because you can use your existing tools to speack the text or you can change the fonts if that helps. For DirectX/OpenGl games I tried using OCR , this is slow and it also has big problems if the game uses "fantastic" fonts = fonts that look like handwriting or other iregular fonts. Maybe when I will have more time I could learn how to inject code in Unity or Unreal games and attempt to detect when the code renders fonts and pipe the text out of the game.

tarboreus 6y ago

One big gaming disappointment for me as a low vision gamer is Inkle. It's all mostly text based and yet they manage to make their games 100% inaccessible. I think Inform 7 is a good example of a very accessible text engine. Twine is pretty accessible in some contexts / exports, but not in others,unless things have changed recently. Chioce of Games is also notably accessible, kudos to them.

matheusmoreira 6y ago

How does a video game engine add support for accessibility? Is there some kind of interface they have to implement?

simion314 6y ago
From my experience as a gamer and not game developer . what a game engine can do is to add support for text to speech TTS for menus , popup messages and in game dialog. This engines will allow you to enable TTS support, and would make it easy for users to change the font sizes for example. I am not sure if there is a cross platform TTS interface. My initial point was that if you want to make a game and not some hobby project try using existing engines, I have nothing against hobby projects I am also considering experimenting with a game that would simulate a world using Prolog , but this would be a toy/experiment.