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Top Web Sites for Accessible Gaming Industry and Community Leaders - 2016

RankSiteComments
1

AbleGamers Foundation

www.ablegamers.com
www.includification.com Unstoppable Gamer
The AbleGamers Foundation is doing more to promote accessibility in computer games than any organization in America.

This year, its founder and leaders, Mark Barlet and Steve Spohn, were invited to the White House to publicize computer accessibility.

To promote accessibility awareness, the organization hosts numerous AbleGamers Events most notably their presence at PAX East and GDC.

AbleGamers Grants give recipients money to buy otherwise unaffordable game-enabling assistive technology. The organization obtains this money through its own fundraising.

The AbleGamers Assistive Technology Lab in the Washington DC area, offers face-to-face technical assistance with game-enabling assistive technologies.

To increase accessibility awareness by mainstream developers, AbleGamers Accessibility Awards are given each year.

A separate, but related Web site, Unstoppable Gamer provides reviews of the accessibility aspects of mainstream games.

Another separate, but related Web site, Includification presents a well organized and useful set of guidelines for developing accessible games.
2

SpecialEffect

www.specialeffect.org.uk
www.gamebase.info
YouTube GameOnForEveryone

 SpecialEffect is the leading organization in the UK dedicated to making computer games accessible to people with disabilities, with a strong emphasis on motion impairment.

They offer direct help and assistive technologies to disabled gamers in the UK. They also accept email queries from outside the UK.

They offer is assessments and recommendations as to how to make computer games accessible to a person with specific needs.

They have a loan library that offers hardware controllers to gamers with special needs.

They put on road shows at schools, hospitals, and organizations throughout the UK, where they demonstrate assistive technologies for gaming.

They offer assistance with eye-gaze controllers: modifying, training, advising and adapting the technology to suit individual needs.

Their Buzz pages provide the latest news about accessible gaming and related events around the UK.

Their YouTube GameOnForEveryone Channel features videos depicting real-world examples of motion impaired gaming.
3

The Game Accessibility Project

www.game-accessibility.com		 This site has been totally rebuilt since its venerable earlier incarnation.

It's objectives are to:
  • Inform gamers with disabilities about the availability of accessible games
  • Provide resources for developers, publishers and researchers
  • Raise awareness of game accessibility
  • Gain more knowledge on accessible game design
It offers reviews, news, help for developers, articles and papers on game accessibility, articles on projects, and a short list of game accessibility organizations.

Their Accessibility Guidelines section offers reviews of, and links to, eight different sets of guidelines.
4

International Game Developers Association - Game Accessibility SIG

igda-gasig.org

IGDA Games Accessibility SIG Listserv Archive		 This is an industry advocacy group seeking to motivate developers to make their games more accessible to gamers with special needs.

The site tends to focus on motion impairment, but also addresses general issues related to disabled gaming.

They offer a Game Accessibility Top Ten list of accessibility features list.

The listserv is active with members of this SIG discussing issues related to game accessibility.
5

D.A.G.E.R.S

dagersystem.com		 Provides reviews and previews of accessible games using the Disabled Accessibility for Gaming Entertainment Rating System.

They explicitly address the issue of accessibility features that are in the version they previewed that might not work the same in the released version.

Games are rated by:
  • Overall Accessibility
  • Auditory Rating
  • Fine-MotorRating
  • Visual Rating
They offer industry news, mostly about new releases.

They present their annual D.A.G.E.R.S Diamond Award for excellence in accessible gaming.

Their industry influence can be seen in the contents of some of the tweets they post.
6

7-128 Software

7128.com		 We include ourselves mostly because of this Top 25 Web Sites for Accessible Gaming effort.

With a lot of help from our friends in the accessible gaming community, we think we've gathered here, in one place, the largest concentration of information about web sites related to accessible gaming.

We hope this is an asset to our industry and to the gamers who need that information.

In addition, our Chief Operating Officer, Eleanor Robinson, speaks at industry events on the topic of accessible games.

She is recognized as one of the leading people with respect to Silver (read older) gamers.

Sites to Watch

These are sites that don't fit in the above rankings, but that we think should be brought to your attention.

SiteComments

Ouch!

www.bbc.co.uk/ouch		 The BBC’s Web site for the disabled.

It offers a constant stream of timely and entertaining articles, blogs, and a message board.

Not specifically for gamers, though they do have related articles.

Survey Methodology

Data comes from 7-128 Software market research of over 100 Web sites relevant to the accessible gaming community, including: developers, gaming media, and organizations.

Ranking is based on, in general order of priority:

Influence on the Industry

To what degree does the site or its organization influence our industry?

This means:
  • Direct contact with industry leaders and developers, to improve game accessibility.
  • Contact and publicity to the general public, to make them aware of game accessibility issues.
  • Guidelines and other assistance to developers, to make their games more accessible.

Service to the Community

To what degree does the site or its organization provide service to the accessible gaming community?

This means:
  • Direct assistance to gamers to make their gaming more accessible.
  • Promoting the public development of assistive technologies to make gaming more accessible.
  • Accessibility information to gamers.
  • Providing community to gamers with accessibility issues.

Currentness

How frequently is the site updated.

This means how often does it get new content.
Sites that have not been updated for a long time are ranked down.

Reach

How well known is the site in the gaming community?

This means how often is the Web site mentioned in forum posts, in media articles, how does it Google. How many comments, and commenters, are there for the Web site’s forum or blog posts. What are its Google and Alexa ratings? What observed influence has it had on our industry.

Alexa rankings indicate how often a Web site's home page is hit by users. Lower values are better.

Sites that have very little traffic or are not mentioned by the gaming community in forums and such, are ranked down.

Accessibility

Web site's 508 compliance.

This means checked with accessibility Web checkers and passes with no failures that would deny reasonable accomodation. It specifically means that the site does not use captcha without at least some alternative means of foiling spammers.

Does it Work?

Do all of its parts work?

This means does it have broken links? Does it have broken Javascript? Is its storefront inoperative or do its free downloads not download? Is the site itself down for a significant part of our year-end survey period? Is the gaming community complaining about lousy service?

Longevity

How long has the site been around.

This means when the Web site was founded.

Breadth vs Depth

Preference is given to breadth.

This means that, all else being equal, Web sites that cover vision, motor, and hearing impairments are ranked higher than sites that cover only one.

Exceptions

Exceptions to the above are put in our unranked Web Sites to Watch section.

Data is current as of May, 2016
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