[games_access]One Switch Tetris / first hello

Thu Oct 19 01:56:07 EDT 2006

Oh, and future updates will include:

- Ghost Image = display a semitransparant copy of the piece on top of the stack, which will help players with placing their piece more correctly
- Stack Colour = whenever a piece is dropped on a stack, the colour of the piece will turn into the stack colour (for instance: grey). Sometimes a piece is already "in position" (in between some gap in the stack, not moving anymore), but the player still has to press [Space] one time to lower it unto the stack. With the change of colour this will become more obvious.
- Colours = manually set colours of the game (for colourblind gamers and gamers which prefer high contrasts)
- Sound! (not specifically accessible for the blind - see below) - just some nice sound to enhance gameplay
- Instructions = to the left there is a space where there will be instructions on how to control the game, using text and an explanatory image. This will be updated during the game, adapting itsself to whatever the gamer needs at that time. For example: this will first say something like "Press Space To Select A Rotation" - with an image of a rotating piece -arrow> still piece, and a spacbar image with a hand. If the player has pressed spece, it will then say "Press and or Hold Space To Lower the Piece", etc.
- Score stuff
- Accessible Settings Menu (with saveable settings)

The game was not meant as an online game, but as a downloadable, by the way.

Since my main expertise is games for the blind and audio games, I still want to search for a way to make this very visual game accessible using sound only while leaving it in tact as much as possible. Don't know when I find time for that, since I hardly have any time to work on this game already :)

Greets,

Richard
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: AudioGames.net 
  To: IGDA Games Accessibility SIG Mailing List 
  Sent: Thursday, October 19, 2006 7:40 AM
  Subject: Re: [games_access]One Switch Tetris / first hello

  Hi,

  Thanks, I like your approach as well. Yes, there are some benefits to mine but it also has some disadvantages. The benefits are that the gameplay is quite up to speed and you still can put blocks in between other blocks . The main disadvantage of my technique is that from the moment you've chosen a rotation, you're stuck with it. Your approach allows players to still rotate a piece while it is lowering, which is more like the original Tetris. The reason I chose this approach was mostly the gameplayspeed issue and I think it works quite well intuively this way (but that's me:). I guess that most of the time players already decide where to put a certain piece either when it is still at the top or when it is previewed in the Next Piece window. 

  Since everything is programmed apart, I also have the following options in One Switch Mode (again, which are *not yet* settable by the player, just by me) :

  - Instant Drop = after selecting a rotation (with [Space]), the piece will pan left and right. When the player presses [Spacebar] the piece will immediately drop all the way down on the stack. In the version you played, [Space] is currently set to "Lower" a piece, not "Drop" it. Instant Drop is the Drop it :)
  - Automatic Lowering During Rotation: On/Off = this will automatically start lowering the piece while it is rotating and the player has not choses a rotation. After the player has selected a rotation, this feature has no influence on the piece anymore (see next).
  - Automatic Lowering (After Rotation): On/Off = this will automatically start lowering the piece after it has been rotated by the player. In this case, pressing [Space] will immediately drop the piece all the way down on the stack (similar to Instant Drop).

  I found that these settings provide quite different (and more difficult) gameplay. While the Automatic Drop During Rotation raises tension, the gameplay is still quite managable. But although the "Instant Drop" functionality speeds up gameplay, I find that the game becomes less of a puzzle and more of a shooter :) Of course, I still have to tweak the parameters but somehow I think that for the current settings of the version that is online now mostly resembles the original Tetris-experience. 

  Anyone else? Robert, don't know if you can access the [Spacebar] but if you can, what do you think of it? I'll make a newer version soon that will let you use any mouseclick as well as any key.

  Greets,

  Richard

    ----- Original Message ----- 
    From: Amit Pitaru [LIST] 
    To: 'IGDA Games Accessibility SIG Mailing List' 
    Sent: Thursday, October 19, 2006 12:17 AM
    Subject: RE: [games_access]One Switch Tetris / first hello

    I love the different approaches we have to the game's accessibility implementation! Where I just stopped the blocks, you streamlined the process into rotate/pan. Clever! 

    Framit

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    From: games_access-bounces at igda.org [mailto:games_access-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of AudioGames.net
    Sent: Wednesday, October 18, 2006 5:03 PM
    To: IGDA Games Accessibility SIG Mailing List
    Subject: Re: [games_access]One Switch Tetris / first hello

    Hi,

    I've spent an afternoon toying with a oneswitch-accessible Tetris. Have a look here: http://www.gluid.com/ost/ . This is not even a beta, like I said, this was done in a couple of hours, so here are the controls:

    [enter] = toggle between One Switch Mode and Regular Mode (the game now starts in One Switch Mode)

    One Switch Mode:

    [space] = first select the rotation (piece will rotate automatically). After selection, the piece will move left and right. Push/Hold space to lower it. 

    Regular Mode:

    [cursor up] = rotate left

    [cursor down] = rotate right

    [cursor left] = move left

    [cursor right] = move right

    [space] = quick drop

    Currently the cursorkeys also work in One Switch Mode. This is just a sketch. All things can be invidivually set (speed for moving left/right/down, rotation, automatic drop on/off in One Switch Mode=currently off) but I haven't come round to programming a One Switch Interface for that :)

    What do you think? Since this is not finished and I guess I'll eventually put it on Game Accessibility.com, please do not hype the link as it is likely to change :)

    Greets,

    Richard

      ----- Original Message ----- 

      From: Amit Pitaru [LIST] 

      To: 'IGDA Games Accessibility SIG Mailing List' 

      Sent: Wednesday, October 18, 2006 10:03 PM

      Subject: RE: [games_access] first hello

      Steve and Robert, thanks for pointing me towards the game-accessibility website! 

      > I think what would be great to learn from you is the techniques and technologies

      Thanks, and I'm happy share everything I've learned. I hope that this chapter that I'm writing will include the most beneficial aspects of the project. Very quickly - it will introduce design techniques for creating inclusive games with care applied to retaining production costs and overall playability. I'll talk about what needs to happen from the hardware, software and policy standpoints. I'll also demonstrate the techniques by retrofitting a simple tetris game for accessibility (very preliminary beta version at http://pitaru.com/tetris), and discuss how some of these ideas can follow through to hardcore games. I hope to get permission from the school to interview the OT's, children and parents. It's all coming together now so I'll have more tangible things to show soon enough.

      Amit 

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      From: games_access-bounces at igda.org [mailto:games_access-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Robert Florio
      Sent: Wednesday, October 18, 2006 11:50 AM
      To: 'IGDA Games Accessibility SIG Mailing List'
      Subject: RE: [games_access] first hello

      Welcome Amit it's a pleasure to have someone with your experience involved in this group.  Whenever we share together also check out www.game-accessibility.com a few of us including myself, gamers with physical impairments forum, moderate the different forums for game accessibility.  I think what would be great to learn from you is the techniques and technologies used to help people with the game accessibility in Long Island.  Thanks for joining.  Feel free to check out my web site and my artwork and efforts for game accessibility.  

      Myself 24 years old living in Maryland United States a quadriplegic from my spinal cord injury and I draw with my mouth and study game design at the Art Institute online.

      Robert

      AI online SGA 

      arthit73 at cablespeed.com 

      www.RobertFlorio.com 

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      From: games_access-bounces at igda.org [mailto:games_access-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Amit Pitaru [LIST]
      Sent: Wednesday, October 18, 2006 10:00 AM
      To: games_access at igda.org
      Subject: [games_access] first hello

      Hello, thank you for having me on the list. My name is Amit Pitaru, I'm a game/toy designer and also a part-time educator at New York University. I also teach art at Cooper Union, and occasionally exhibit my work (http://pitaru.com and http://insertsilence.com)

      I learned about the SIG while working on a chapter for a book on games that is commissioned by the MacArthur foundation. The chapter is based on a two year project with a special-needs school in Long Island, where I devised hardware and software for gaming accessibility. I hope to tell you more about it as we chat along.

      So again, thank you for having me, I think I finally found a good home-base to learn and share my thoughts.

      Cheerio

      Amit Pitaru

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