X3: FL and BLind Accessibility

[CaplinCaplin]

Hi All,

I'm an occasional fan of X3 and related games, who has posted here previously about my attempts to enjoy them as a totally blind player. Thus far it's somewhat frustrating, depending on the game, as my methods for getting information out of the UI are fairly primitive OCR provided by my screen reader, and patience.

I realize X3: FL will probably not fundamentally change this situation, since as far as I know it's built on the same game engine as the other X3 titles.

Nevertheless, I wonder if any of the mechanics and/or modding changes might improve the accessibility situation, or alternatively make it harder to enjoy the game.

I generally explore by using autopilot to fly from object to object, focusing largely on trading and eschewing space combat as much as possible. I don't know much about the new exploration mechanics, but am wary of anything which requires me to fly in 3D space, if only because it's very difficult for me to do reliably.

I know this is a very broad ask, but I'd love any thoughts from folks more familiar with he upcoming changes. Am I going to be able to get anything from the new game, or am I better off sticking to TC and AP?

Thanks much for any thoughts.

[MegaBurn]

Caplin,
That's interesting. From what is known publicly, FL will have a much greater potential to be modified to increase accessibility, but there isn't enough detail on the new features to say if any are more accessible as-is. Similarly, there is almost no detail on changes to older gameplay from TC & AP. Cycrow said the menus are script controlled, which means it should be easy for modders to add more descriptive text, and new menus.

For X3 in general, most gameplay behavior is exposed to scripting, and it should be readily possible add more accessibility tools. The hardest part would be recruiting skilled scripters to help develop such features. For example, scripts can play sound files and gather all sorts of information, so a wide range of beeps, tones, chirps, blips, etc could provide audio feedback about object proximity, target distance, objects detected, almost any kind of nearby game events, and a smaller variety of out-of-sector events. Another example, auto pilot commands follow step by step script logic, these could be used to create a semi-auto guidance tool, with descriptive text, break points for player decisions, audio cues, etc, e.g. for exploring sectors, scanning asteroids, mining, salvaging, etc. If combat is more headache than excitement, use cheats to make the player neutral with everything, maybe disable collisions too.

[CBJ]

As you've already noted, the game engine on which the game is based doesn't give a huge amount of scope for us to improve things for the blind and visually impaired. Quite honestly, I think the new exploration feature within the game would indeed be rather frustrating for people with limited vision, primarily because the feedback it provides is pretty much exclusively visual.

Unfortunately I'm not sure that there's much we can do about that in the base game at this stage. However, we do have a number of talented modders on the team, and I've issued them with a challenge to see if they can come up with a mod that provides some form of audio feedback for the exploration process!

[CaplinCaplin]

Hey,

If I can help out in any way, I'm happy to do so. My experience with the games in general is limited, but I love the ideas behind them even if in practice the experience itself is difficult.

wIthout a doubt the 3D flight aspect is the most inaccessible, combat a close second. I would love to find a way to improve either situation, but am uncertain how to go about it. At the moment I've got a couple scripts which help with logging data to text files which are easier for the screen reader to understand, but that's quite limited and obviously doesn't work for real-time gameplay.

Thanks for your thoughts, all.