It would seem to me that the same problem exists whether the game is online
or not. Not enough blind customers to make it worth the developer's time
and effort. They would still ask, "Where's my profit in doing this extra
work? Would it be worth the expense to sell 1,000 games after modifying the
game?"
---
Shepherds are the best beasts.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Nick Helms" <nick.he...@gmail.com>
To: "Gamers Discussion list" <gamers@audyssey.org>
Sent: Saturday, August 15, 2009 9:31 PM
Subject: Re: [Audyssey] mainstream accessibility was: Re: the real
gamecircle
Hi,
Just my thinking on this.
I totally agree with Che. There is just no way that the mainstream
gaming developers will begin to really notice us.
There are just too many sited gamers and not enough blind interest.
But I think that what you’re forgetting are the online games.
There are tuns of online games that could be improved and could become
playable for the blind.
True, the blind might not be able to game on a level with an X-box,
but we can certainly work with accessability when it comes to online
games, because, especially with massively multi-player games, the game
doesn’t stop. It doesn’t have a shelf-life.
And that’s why we should be getting those developers to make axcess
improvements for their games, the online games.
Best,
Nick
On 8/15/09, Thomas Ward <thomasward1...@gmail.com> wrote:
Hi,
And while we are at it here is another thing to keep in mind. Even if,
miricles of miricles, all the mainstream companies decided to start
making their games accessible that would only apply to new and up coming
titles. What about the hundreds perhaps thousands of titles currently on
the market already?
I can pretty much tell you what will happen. Many people on this list
would begin badgering the mainstream companies to go back and rewrite or
upgrade this and that title so they could play it. That simply would not
be at all cost effective. Especially, since game titles have a short
shelf life relatively speaking. Once the title has sold x number of
copies it is done and over with as far as the company is concerned.
Asking them to go back and upgrade all those games to be accessible
would be impossible. At the very least extremely prohibitively expensive
with very little financial return.
For example, most of the accessible games out there are written in VB 6
and use DirectX 8. Both technologies are rather old, technically
speaking, and I'd like to see them all be updated to something newer
like VB .NET with SlimDX or C# .NET with SlimDX. However, asking
accessible game developers to do that is not very realistic or
practical. Too much time and work went into the games the first time,
and rewriting them to match current programming standards/specifications
would be a major undertaking. One with very little financial return. It
would be better for the developer to start out with a newer programming
language, newer game API, and a fresh game idea rather than try and go
back and rewrite all their old games in the hopes of trying to keep up
with technology changes. That's exactly how the mainstream game
companies would see it.
In the end even if mainstream companies decide to take up the cause for
game accessibility we are still going to lose out on a lot of good
games. It is expensive, not very practical, or in their best interests
to go back and upgrade everything just to satisfy a small market. As
much as it pains me to say it sometimes we just have to have to accept
this is how things are, and probably always will be in our life time.
Che wrote:
----- I hate to be a defeattist, but this is a lost cause guys.
As mentioned again and again, blind gamers don't even register on
mainstream companies radars.
The problem here it seems to me is people think " Oh, they just need
to change this or that and we could have accessibility to this game"
But it isn't that easy, in fact it is quite man hour intensive, and
there is no way these game companies can recoup the loss in salary for
the work.
Consider this somewhat overblown analogy:
It is technically possible for blind people to drive cars. a system
has been developed by Mercedes Benz where cars can recognize where
other cars are located front to back. , systems could be developed to
tell you where to turn, automatically break at the proper places, etc.
Why aren't we all jumping up and down demanding this be done? Because
we all know it would cost ungodly amounts of money and infrastructure
re design to get it done. It simply isn't going to happen. If you ran
a mainstream gaming company, you would look at things much the same
way once you saw the numbers on what it would cost to include
accessibility for the blind for your next title, versus the few extra
sales you would get out of it.
If you really want kick butt games out there for the blind, learn
some programming, take that great idea you have and make it a reality.
Trust me, it can be done. I did it, grin.
You can help in other ways as well. If you bought a game and you
think it is just the bee's knees, get the word out, let others know
about it. our main source of marketing is word of mouth, we just need
more words from your mouth, hehehe.
Also, , if you are hosting any cracked versions of accessible games
out there, stop and think a minute about the harm you are doing. It is
apples and oranges comparing hosting mainstream title cracks versus
accessible games. In such a small market, even one source of a cracked
game is very harmful, while the big boys wouldn't even notice it.
Please, just think about all the man hours that go into these projects
and think about how you would feel if someone was out there robbing
from you like that. I know there are more than a few people on this
list that host cracked accessible games, and I just don't get you guys.
Finally, rather than just complain about this or that about a title
in development, provide constructive criticism, all developers want to
hear how they can make their games better, but just complaining does
no good to anyone.
Later
che
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