How to build accessibility in from the start

1 The bottom line

Plan controls, text, colour, sound and comfort options as part of the design, and build them once your code is stable. Every option you skip shuts out players who would otherwise love your game.

2 Key takeaways

• Treat accessibility as a pillar, and build the options when your code is near final. Too early, the code gets thrown out. Too late, retrofitting is a nightmare.
  • Forza Horizon 5 made accessibility a core pillar, which is why it ships with a huge number of features Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit9:38.
  • Mind Over Magnet's accessibility pass came when the character code was hopefully final Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit9:09.
• Let players reshape the controls: remap, toggle, shortcut and automate. Remapping alone does not solve motor needs.
  • Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart offers full remapping and makes nearly every hold a toggle, and 70 percent of the sampled games offered full remapping Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit1:32.
  • Far Cry 6 gives each button press, hold and double tap slots for any action Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit1:57.
• Make text and subtitles large, plain and player-adjustable. Text size is where games most often fail.
  • In Far Cry New Dawn, 97% of players kept the default subtitles on Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:23.
  • Prey puts its subtitles on a semi-transparent black box, which works against any background Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:10.
• Never carry critical information by colour alone or sound alone. Adding a second cue removes the problem instead of patching it.
  • Recore puts white arrows on enemy health bars that match the d-pad direction used to switch bullet colour Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:11.
  • Resident Evil 2 makes Mr. X trackable only by his footsteps, with no visual cue Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit1:35.
• Give players switches for motion and flashes, and more than one way through a puzzle. No single fix works for everyone.
  • Just Shapes & Beats has a mode that turns off flashes Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit2:24.
  • Shadows of Doubt lets you trace a killer through footprints, fingerprints, CCTV or phone call history Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit19:56.

This is not the time to keep up your brand identity, this is the time for clarity.

Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit

2.1 Plan it into the schedule

Accessibility survives only if you decide early that it matters, and time its build and its cost.

• Make accessibility a core design pillar. Forza Horizon 5's creative director explained that the team did this Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit9:38.
  • A pillar means every system gets considered for accessibility.
  • It also means the work is not cut when a deadline looms.
  • The result is that Forza Horizon 5 ships with a huge number of features.
• Design input for every device from day one. Word Play was built to work across mouse, controller, keyboard and touch Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit0:22.
  • This made the spelling experience work seamlessly everywhere.
  • It shipped on PC, Mac and Steam Deck, and an iPad was used for playtesting.
• Build the options once the code is near final. Mark chose the point where the character code was hopefully final Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit9:09.
  • His pass added remappable controls, toggle aiming, low sensitivity snap aim, and switches for particles, trails and screen shake.
  • Too soon, and code and ideas are thrown out constantly. Too late, and retrofitting is a nightmare.
• Save every option in one place and read it in every level. Mind Over Magnet uses a single options manager that saves to disk Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit1:20.
  • Choices like aim toggle, remapping, magnet colour and accessibility symbols then persist across the whole game, not just a test level.
  • Expect a cost. Mark dropped one option because it added too much junk to an already messy, oversized script Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit10:21.

2.2 Controls players can reshape

Let players move, soften or replace any input that demands grip, force, speed or precision.

• Build full remapping into the game, on console too. Remapping is one of the most requested accessibility options Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit2:21.
  • It lets players put fire or accelerate on a face button when pulling a trigger hurts.
  • Console-wide remapping is tedious to redo per game and cannot handle a different layout per mode, such as on-foot or driving Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit5:47.
  • Crash Bandicoot 4, Sackboy: A Big Adventure, Marvel's Avengers and Hades all ship full in-game remapping Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit5:47.
  • Overwatch, Titanfall 2 and Nier: Automata offer it on console, while Spider-Man lacks it.
• Replace holds and button-bashing with toggles and skips. Forcing a player to hold a button can make a game completely inaccessible to some disabilities Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit5:44.
  • Battlefield 4 lets you press once to aim down sights and press again to return.
  • Mario Kart 8 can make karts drive forward by themselves.
  • It Takes Two, Guardians of the Galaxy and House of Ashes let players skip button-mashing quick time events Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit2:57.
  • Metroid Dread needs several buttons held at once and very granular stick movement, with no controller options in the menu Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:15.
  • Remapping isn't enough for many players with motor needs, so Ghost of Tsushima lets you avoid QTEs, Watch Dogs has auto-drive and DOOM Eternal has heavy aim assistance Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit1:06:47.
• Give hard inputs a shortcut, a slot or an automatic mode. Fewer required inputs lower the physical demand without changing the goals.
  • Far Cry 6 splits each button into press, hold and double tap, and has a mode with no stick presses Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit1:57.
  • Spider-Man: Miles Morales puts d-pad shortcuts on tricky inputs, including two-button ones Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit4:53.
  • Bayonetta 2's automatic mode performs advanced combos with one button Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit5:25.
  • FIFA 21 reduces play to one button using predictive design Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit4:53.
  • Uncharted: The Lost Legacy has a camera assist and flipped sticks, and The Witness on PC has click-to-move, so each works with one hand or stick Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit4:38.
• Offer a conventional alternative to motion controls, and expose sensitivity. If a player cannot shake a device, or cannot stop shaking it, a motion-only game will not work Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit2:57.
  • Splatoon lets players turn motion off and use twin-stick aiming Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:26.
  • Titanfall 2 exposes the response curve, dead zone and ramp-up time. For most games a cursor speed slider is enough Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:56.
  • Star Fox Zero removes the option to turn motion off, and its right stick is already busy with Arwing maneuvers Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:26.
  • Deathloop and Outriders use sluggish virtual cursors in menus, while Far Cry 6 and Pokemon Snap also allow d-pad navigation Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit2:57.
  • On PC, XCOM-style keyboard shortcuts save mouse travel, and a windowed mode that does not lock the mouse lets players use the Windows on-screen keyboard Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:37.

2.3 Text and subtitles people can read

Make every line of text big, plain, complete and under the player's control.

• Make text large by default and let players scale it. Text size is the area where games most frequently fail Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit5:18.
  • Size subtitles so they read from across a room, then add a size option. Tiny subtitles are the most common mistake Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit2:15.
  • Scale the whole UI so icons grow too, as Planet Zoo, Ghost Recon Breakpoint and Borderlands 3 do.
  • Test that scaling does not cause overlapping text or buttons going off screen Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit6:42.
  • Tales of Arise has fine cutscene subtitles but microscopic words during gameplay and combat Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit4:46.
  • Yakuza: Like a Dragon has no font size option, though its text boxes are mostly empty Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit6:42.
• Choose clarity over style. Use a clean sans serif, because stylised fonts add effort players cannot spare Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit2:45.
  • Put subtitles on a semi-transparent black box. Pale text with a thin outline gets camouflaged against bright or busy scenes Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:10.
  • Keep lines to about 37 to 42 characters and two lines on screen Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:40.
  • For dyslexic players, use mixed case, 1.5x line spacing and a solid background Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:18.
  • Detroit: Become Human is easy to read, while Metal Gear Solid V uses a scribbly font.
  • Batman: Arkham Asylum shows "Who called the elevator!?" seconds before Batman hears it, which is what long paragraphs can do Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:40.
• Caption every line, and show who is speaking. Partial subtitles leave gaps that hurt players in practice Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit4:25.
  • Include commentary, cutscenes and enemy barks. Breakpoint's untranscribed barks let enemies get the drop on players.
  • Caption minor background chatter that carries gameplay information Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit5:55.
  • Turn subtitles on by default Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:23.
  • In Hitman, guards say whether you can enter an area in your disguise, but those lines are not subtitled Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit5:55.
  • Valhalla leaves Eivor's inner monologue uncaptioned, and Final Fantasy 7 Remake skips mid-combat barks Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit5:35.
• Let players read at their own speed. Never advance text automatically, because players read and comprehend at different speeds Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:54.
  • Wait for a button press, as Bloodstained does, or let players pause dialogue, as Tangle Tower does Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit7:41.
  • When subtitles must time out, hold them about 0.3 seconds per word and leave a short gap between lines Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit4:35.
  • Offer a dyslexia-friendly or plain font as a menu choice Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:47.
  • Outer Wilds pauses its always-ticking clock while you read Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit7:41.
  • The Last Door offered Open Dyslexic, and its creators said 14% of people who finished the game used it Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:47.
  • Untitled Goose Game lets players swap its cursive to-do list for a basic font Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit7:04.

2.4 Colour and visual clarity

Design so colour is never the only signal, then let players adjust what remains.

• Add a second cue to anything that relies on colour. Shapes, symbols, shading or animation remove the problem instead of patching it Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:11.
  • Check HUD elements, alerts, enemy types, crosshairs, explosive barrels, loot rarity, damage indicators and waypoints.
  • Give each base colour a unique symbol and combine them for mixtures, as Chromagun does. Keep them in an optional mode so they do not clutter the screen for everyone Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit4:34.
  • Mind Over Magnet's green and orange buttons were nearly indistinguishable with some types of colour blindness Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:39.
  • After feedback, Mind Over Magnet added a plus and a minus that show where the magnet will sail Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit9:43.
  • Among Us patched in symbols so colourblind players could complete colour-based tasks, and Lair of the Clockwork God lets players disable its colour puzzles Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit8:02.
• Pick colours that survive, and let players swap the rest. Blue and orange stand apart for all three major types of colour blindness Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit5:54.
  • Strong light and dark contrast also works, and black and white are visible to everyone.
  • Where you cannot design around colour, let players change team and enemy colours, and show the change on the options screen itself Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit5:09.
  • Battlefield 1 lets players swap squad, enemy, team and opposing colours, because red and green clash for deuteranopia and green and blue merge for tritanopia Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit5:09.
  • Splatoon lets players lock team colours to light orange and dark blue on their own console only Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit7:16.
  • Mind Over Magnet ships its magnet in black and white and tints it in code, so players can pick any colours Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit9:43.
• Let players cut visual noise and boost what matters. In busy games like Hades, it can be hard to know what is happening Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit7:49.
  • Offer sliders for key elements, such as UI opacity in Dirt 5, loot brightness in DOOM Eternal and crosshair colour in Valorant.
  • Spider-Man and The Last of Us have shader modes that wash out the background and highlight characters in colours the player picks.
  • Mind Over Magnet lets players swap its sewer art for the plain grid from the rough draft Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit7:37.
• Test colour with filters and with colourblind players. Run the game through a simulation and check whether critical information is lost Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit2:11.
  • Color Oracle is a static tool and Sim Daltonism works in real time.
  • Unreal Engine includes filters by default, Unity has plugins, and playtesting with colourblind gamers is better still.

2.5 Sound that does not stand alone

Give every sound that drives a decision a visual twin, and let players talk without a voice.

• Pair every important audio cue with a visual one. Without sound, a player is completely screwed if the cue is audio only Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit7:12.
  • Call of Duty pairs its grenade bark with a clear visual cue.
  • Ghost of Tsushima can mark incoming ranged attacks with an icon Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit6:16.
  • Overwatch's ultimate lines like "it's high noon" have no subtitle or visual cue, and Metal Gear Solid V's unsubtitled "Grenada!" shout has the same problem.
  • Resident Evil 2 gave no visual footstep cue, and CanIPlayThat called it virtually unplayable early on for deaf and hard of hearing players Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit1:35.
• Caption nearby sounds with direction and distance. Far Cry 6 captions nearby audio sources with an arrow and a distance Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit4:21.
  • Watch Dogs: Legion and Assassin's Creed use a captioning system borrowed from Far Cry New Dawn to show where noises come from Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit6:16.
  • Gears 5 subtitles its music sting as "music settles" Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit1:35.
  • Resident Evil Village has excellent audio but no way to express it to a hard-of-hearing player.
• Let multiplayer teammates share information without audio. Apex Legends' ping system pairs a subtitled voice line with a visual indicator Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit2:31.
  • Pings can mark areas, enemies and objects.
  • Apex can also turn text chat into voice and voice chat into text.
• Narrate the menus so blind players can start the game. Menu narration is a powerful feature that many games now include Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit4:52.
  • Some games turn it on by default so players can reach the settings unaided.
  • Forza Horizon 5, Age of Empires IV, It Takes Two, Far Cry 6, Riders Republic, Battlefield and Back 4 Blood all have it.
  • Day of the Tentacle's audio signposting is easy to miss when you cannot always hear it a second time Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit7:36.

2.6 Comfort, clarity and difficulty

Give players switches for motion and flashes, and make the game forgiving to learn and to solve.

• Let players turn off camera-moving effects. Simulation sickness comes from eyes seeing movement while the inner ear feels none Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit1:08.
  • Offer toggles for weapon bob, head bob, screen shake and motion blur, plus field of view and sensitivity controls.
  • Use smooth camera transitions instead of quick snaps and fast zooms, even by default Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit1:42.
  • A crosshair option helps even in games without guns, like The Witness.
  • Turning off screen shake altogether is a nice touch, so juice does not exclude anyone Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit9:47.
• Let players disable flashes and repeating patterns, and test your footage. Sensory overload mostly comes from quick flashes and regular moving patterns Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit2:24.
  • It affects people with autism, migraines and photosensitive epilepsy.
  • Upload recorded gameplay to the Harding flash and pattern analyser, which reports anything that fails its criteria Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit2:49.
  • Stardew Valley lets you change its falling snow effect.
  • Ubisoft and other big publishers use the Harding service Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit2:49.
• Give players more than one way to solve, learn and be reminded. Offer several routes to the same answer so no one is stuck on a single clue Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit19:56.
  • Offworld Trading Company has scripted walkthroughs plus practice challenges for trial and error Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit19:09.
  • Show hints visually where you can. Mind Over Magnet's dotted lines need no English Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit15:08.
  • Repeat objectives in simple language and keep them on screen Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit4:25.
  • Hypnospace Outlaw lets you farm currency and pay for access if you cannot find a clever way in.
  • Total War provides separate tutorials for newcomers and returning players Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit19:09.
  • Assassin's Creed Odyssey states objectives in a few simple sentences with highlighted key words that stay on screen for the whole mission Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit4:25.
• Keep the price of admission low, and let different skill levels play together. Control mastery is an entrance fee, and if it is too high, players stay outside the turnstile Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit4:58.
  • Make first-time play good even in complex games, rather than asking players to learn the controls over a second playthrough Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit11:50.
  • Use asymmetric roles. In Super Mario Galaxy, the second player is a floating cursor that picks up star bits and stuns enemies Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:12.
  • Remakes should ease in new players. The first Resident Evil remake did, and The Last of Us Part 1 shipped with perhaps the most extensive accessibility options seen in a game Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit8:02.
  • Deep social gameplay may exclude players who find social skills hard, such as gamers with autism, so consider options there too Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit11:13.

2.7 Where designers disagree

Some choices depend on timing and product, and a few popular fixes work for only some players.

• Pillar from day one, or options near the end of the build?
  • Forza Horizon 5 treated accessibility as a pillar so it reached every system and survived deadlines Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit9:38.
  • Mind Over Magnet's options were built only when the code was near final, since earlier work gets thrown out and later work is a nightmare Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit9:09.
  • The two fit together if you commit to the goal early and build the options once the code settles. Plan for the cost, because one option was dropped for adding too much junk to the script Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit10:21.
• Full-screen colourblind filters, or targeted palettes?
  • Filters are hard to get right and often make the game look bizarre. Settings should only make vital information clear Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit6:20.
  • Separate palettes for deuteranopia or protanopia, for tritanopia, and for black and white avoid that, because one recolour will not suit everyone Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit5:36.
  • Overwatch's filters help some players but leave many with a game that looks "utterly bonkers", and Doom's deuteranopia mode just shows what the game looks like with that deficiency Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit6:20.
• Name the speaker on every line, or colour the dialogue?
  • God of War puts the speaker's name on every line, which works but enlarges the subtitles and adds redundant reading Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit5:45.
  • Rise of the Tomb Raider names a character once and then colours their dialogue, which is cleaner.
  • Guardians of the Galaxy and Hitman 3 show other routes: speaker names with big text, or a speech bubble over the speaker's head Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:36.
• Subtitles on by default, or a choice before the game begins?
  • Ubisoft found that nearly everyone left default subtitles on Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:23.
  • Offering the choice before the game begins is the other good approach Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit3:23.
• Remove puzzle hints, or keep them under player control?
  • Spoken hints can help players with cognitive impairments who would otherwise be locked out, so the better answer is giving players control over them rather than removing them Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit1:37.