Hi Thomas, excellent point about affecting the decisions of manufacturers.
Let me suggest that this is where our lobbies come in or rather, are supposed to come in. ;) Groups such as the ACB and NFB are really supposed to be fulfilling these roles as they do place themselves in the position of being the voice of the blind. Until we can simply get wide-ranging notions in place in society that we are just as varied a group of individuals as our sighted counterparts (though our numbers are much smaller) the lack of awareness will continue. Right now, the average individual really has only the occasional concept of the 'Hollywood' version of the blind person, in essence. Once that portrayal is gone from the consciousness then the subject never comes up again, until the next stereotypical 'Hollywood' portrayal arises. We need to not only have a more constant portrayal of blind individuals but also a more realistic and wide ranging portrayal of said individuals. In other words, many more of us need to be seen and heard from on a national and world stage, more often. This will help to enhance peoples' general consciousness on a daily basis and help to bring this community more out of the shadows. Short of this, I'm not sure how quickly progress will be made. Does this make sense? this sort of thing can start as simply as a person giving a talk at a school or library. Despite the fact that it may seem like we should be much further along than this, as a society in the 21st century, many, many people are still very interested / curious about how blind people go about their daily lives in the world. Many people really do want to understand and do care. this includes CEOs as much as it includes the quote average person. The info just needs to be out there more. :) This truly is a question of basic awareness. Thanks for a great topic! Smiles, Cara :) --- iOS design and development - LookTel.com --- View my Online Portfolio at: http://www.onemodelplace.com/CaraQuinn Follow me on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ModelCara On Dec 3, 2013, at 4:34 AM, Thomas Ward <thomasward1...@gmail.com> wrote: Hi Dark: I know. The problem is, as you well know, there is a certain mindset about the blind that we are all over 60, that we wouldn't be interested in anything like that, and so the companies that manufacturer and sell accessible card and board games tend to stick to the bog standard games like Monopoly without any variations. The problem is I can go to Walmart, Toys-R-Us, or any other mainstream store and find all kinds of interesting variations on basic card and board games. In Monopoly there was the Lord of the Rings, Star Trek, Star Wars, and several other variations. One of the coolest was the Millennium edition of Monopoly which had lighted houses and hotels, street lights, and made noises when your piece landed on one of the railroads etc. It was awesome, but of course they wouldn't make anything that cool for us. There also have been many variations on the game of Life. One of the variations I have is a Pirates of the Caribbean set where you get to play as one of the main characters from the movies, buy a pirate ship, and gather plunder. I have also scene, but never played, a couple of children's variations of Life such as one based on Sponge Bob Square Pants and another one based on the Simpson's. Both would be cute to own and play. Trouble, a game I don't believe has ever been made accessible, has had all kinds of variations too such as Star Wars, Disney, Transformers, etc. The variations don't really change the game much, but one thing I liked about the Star Wars edition of Trouble is there was an R2-D2 for the popper and it would light up, beep, and added something extra to the game besides the standard clear plastic bubble. Getting back to the point until we are able to effect the decisions of the people who make these games that we are just as interested in playing those games as the sighted person we are going to continue to get stuck with the same old boring versions of Monopoly, Life, Checkers, Chess, and whatever else are available through the blind organizations. Playing a game like Talisman isn't going to happen unless we make up our own accessible set of cards and boards etc. Cheers! On 12/3/13, dark <d...@xgam.org> wrote: > That's fair enough Tom, and indeed I wasn't suggesting you create something > > like that, ---- since for a start Talisman has already been pretty bad about > > stamping out computerized versions of their board games, (the scum). > > It just sometimes irritates me that while games like Talisman are > intrinsically no less accessible than monopoly, there is no accessible > version made of them. > > Beware the Grue! > > Dark. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
