As someone who enjoys gaming, I’ve always felt that this hobby should be accessible for everyone, and that means making sure players of all abilities can enjoy their favorite titles without barriers. With over 429 million players worldwide having some form of disability, accessibility in gaming is more important than it has ever been. Thankfully companies like Xbox agree and at this year’s Game Developers Conference (GDC), Xbox has teamed up with Electronic Arts, Google, Nintendo of America, Ubisoft, and to name a few, as part of the new Accessible Games Initiative.
Led by the Entertainment Software Association (ESA), this initiative is all about making accessibility info clear and consistent across the industry. With a new set of standardized tags, players can easily see what accessibility features a game offers before they buy. To keep things simple, Xbox will swap out our existing tags for the new initiative’s tags wherever they match. Any Xbox-specific tags that don’t have an equivalent will stick around.
While this doesn’t affect me, it’s exciting to see that this movement will empower others to enjoy games as much as I do, and taking a cue, it will inspire other developers to build even more accessibility features into their games. This always hasn’t been the issue and even on big titles, they tend to lack features that leave other games out in the cold. It stinks, so hopefully this helps to change all that.
According to Xbox, it is already working to add these new tags to Xbox games, and soon, you’ll see them in digital Xbox experiences. In the meantime, you can visit the Accessible Games Initiative website to learn more about what each tag means.
And if you missed it, Xbox recently released its Xbox Adaptive Joystick, which can be purchased directly via the Microsoft store. Priced at $29.99, this joystick can be connected to the Xbox Adaptive Controller, to provide a more refined experience.
