This article presents the result from a study comparing the perception and understanding of a game story between sighted and visually impaired players playing the same game. In particular, whether sighted and visually impaired players could experience and recount the same story construed from the plot elements that are either manifested by audio and graphics in the case of sighted players or primarily by audio in the case of visually impaired players. To this end, we have developed a graphical point-and-click adventure game for iOS and Android devices that aims to show how inclusive game design may be used to facilitate a shared gaming experience between sighted and visually impaired players. The game provides players with audio feedback that enables visually impaired players to interact with and experience the game, but in a manner that does not interfere with the overall appearance and functionality of the game. Thus, it has been designed to be fully inclusive to both groups of players and to give the same gaming experience when it comes to story content. The game has been evaluated through formal user tests where subjects have been asked to play the first chapter of the game followed by an interview. The study shows that the perception of the story was almost identical between the two groups. Generally it took visually impaired players a little longer to play the game but they also seem to listen more carefully to the dialogue and hence also build a slightly deeper understanding of the characters. The study also shows that the sighted players did not respond negatively towards the inclusive game design employed in the game.

A lot of video games on the market are inaccessible to players with visual impairments because they rely heavily on use of graphical elements. This paper presents a project aimed at developing a point-and-click adventure game for smart phones and tablets that is equally functional and enjoyable by blind and sighted players. This will be achieved by utilizing audio to give blind players all necessary information and enjoyment without graphics. In addition to creating the game, the aim of the project is to identify design aspects that can be applied to more types of games to include more players. This paper also presents a pilot study that has been conducted on an early version of the game and the preliminary findings are discussed.

Voice acting is common in computer games in many genres. The recording and processing of voice acting is a time-consuming process that involves, for instance, voice actors, directors, audio engineers, and game writers. Changes to the script of a game after the voice acting has been recorded are expensive. At the same time, playtests of games without voice acting may give different results than testing where it is present. This creates a situation where improvements identified from play testing are either ignored or leads to extensive re-recording of voice acting. This article presents a design science research project where text-to-speech (TTS) synthesis is used as a substitute for recorded voice acting in the early stages of game production. We propose a set of design principles that have been evaluated in a sharp game production. Our results indicate several benefits of using TTS as a prototyping tool: It can be a source of inspiration for game writers, it gives good estimations on timing and pacing of the game, and it allows for early tests of how the dialog will be perceived by players. The quality and characteristics of the voices provided by the TTS system play an important role in this process. The rapid development in the speech technology field opens many future possibilities.