Are You Willing To Throw The Dice On A Roleplaying Game?
No longer solely the passion of freaks & geeks, roleplaying games (or RPGs) are enjoying a resurgence thanks to television shows such as Stranger Things. But how accessible are desktop games (like Dungeons & Dragons) or online roleplaying games to the blind & partially sighted community? Connect Radio’s Kris Wallace has been talking to author Oliver Kennett and RNIB’s Lisa Foulkes-Arnold about various RPGs to find out.
If you play RPGs or would like to join the conversation tweet us @RNIBRadio and if you are interested in joining, or starting, a roleplaying game there are some helpful links below.
https://www.meetup.com/topics/dnd/?_cookie-check=S5YGlLdxTj7paIO4
https://twitter.com/oliverkennett
Accessible Online Role Playing Games
Colossal Cave Adventure – first text based ‘interactive fiction’
Single player
Mid-1970s
Recently highlighted on Amazon Prime series Halt and Catch
Fire
Still available on http://www.amc.com/shows/halt-and-catch-fire/exclusives/colossal-cave-adventure
Multi-User Dungeons (MUD)
• Natural progression for Dungeons and Dragons going online
• First MUD in 1978. Many have been running for decades
• Multiplayer real-time virtual world, text-based combination of role-playing games, interactive fiction, and online chat
• Most are Visual Impairment friendly
• Screen reader friendly MUD clients – Mudlet, Mushclient
• Also VIPMud, but this one isn’t free
A few good MUDs:
Discworld www.discworld.starturtle.net /
Asks at beginning if you are using a screen reader
Materia Magica www.materiamagica.com
Has a built in client, and asks about sight impaired
mode right at the start
Aardwolf www.aardwolf.com, built in client
Advertises as VI friendly
Avalon www.avalon-rpg.com
Has a page with information for VI players:
www.valon-rpg.com/info/blind
Realm of Magic https://realmofmagic.org
Has a special login for screen readers
Games created specifically for vision impaired players:
Shades of Doom www.gmagames.com
An audio first person shooter which creates a virtual reality using sound as it's medium. It features multi-dimensional multi-layered sound
Entombed, www.blind-games.com/entombed.aspx
Written expressly for blind players, it is voice only. The keyboard is used to move around and do actions.
Other places to check:
www.whitestick.co.uk/ongames.html (screen reader friendly)
www.audiogames.net
List of VI friendly games, but no descriptions
www.sonokids.org
Audio based games for visually impaired kids
www.gmagames.com
Creators of fully accessible games
Video Consoles
Xbox- One has a built in magnifier and narrator
Phones / Tablets
Applevis https://www.applevis.com/
Reviews accessible apps, including games
A Blind Legend – action/adventure game which is sound only, using binaural 3D sound
Apps for Apple, Android, and Windows
King of Dragon Pass – interactive fiction
Frotz - interactive fiction
Chess-wise - chess
Papa Sangre – role playing game
Audio Game Hub – a set of audio based arcade games
Amazon Echo / Alexa
Lots of interactive fiction
Runescape – RPG re-written to be audio only