I read it as a game design/development question brought about by the community, not a community question. The community uses VOIP. It generally makes the content easier for those that do. Therefore, the designers/developers begin designing/developing around those that use VOIP. The question could have been asked without regard to those that are deaf.
Should developers ignore those that do not use VOIP when designing games?
I don't see much evidence that developers actually are designing content around the use of VOIP. If anything I would say that content has generally become simpler and less challenging as the genre has developed.
Also, when it comes down to it, VOIP often doesn't make content any easier it is just more convenient. For most encounters the raid instructions can just as easily be macroed raid warnings, it just requires a bit more preparation.
I read it as a game design/development question brought about by the community, not a community question. The community uses VOIP. It generally makes the content easier for those that do. Therefore, the designers/developers begin designing/developing around those that use VOIP. The question could have been asked without regard to those that are deaf.
Should developers ignore those that do not use VOIP when designing games?
I don't see much evidence that developers actually are designing content around the use of VOIP. If anything I would say that content has generally become simpler and less challenging as the genre has developed.
Also, when it comes down to it, VOIP often doesn't make content any easier it is just more convenient. For most encounters the raid instructions can just as easily be macroed raid warnings, it just requires a bit more preparation.
Was more the case of my opinion that it was the OP was trying to state - that indeed developers were designing around VOIP and thus ignoring those that are deaf (or do not use VOIP) as such.
I agree more wtth content being dumbed down than it being designed around VOIP. Pretty soon games will be a case of logging in, getting a message telling us that we need to log back in "x" many times, and we will be rewarded with a shiny "I Win!" button...sigh.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
There is tech out there that allows voice to text. Im not sure how far its gotten,but maybe the developers can integrate it in and help people who are deaf. Im not sure of the cost. Maybe vent can add this in also. Just a thought.
Captions are often in error, and that's usually done by a person. How good would you expect an automated system to be? A lot of people are barely understandable on vent as it is...
That said, WOW already has the bosses emote or otherwise show whatever they're going to do, and certainly addons like DBM do.
Any guild that couldn't find an accomodation for a deaf person, or somebody who couldn't use vent is...there own problem.
This isn't a developer issue, this is a player base issue or the arrogance of one guild it seems. THere is nothing a developer or publisher can do to keep other players from being asses. If the WoW community doesn't offer a friendly enviroment for that player, i say that player say screw them and their game and join the dozens of other games with better communities and guilds.
parrotpholk-Because we all know the miracle patch fairy shows up the night before release and sprinkles magic dust on the server to make it allllll better.
If you have one arm, do you expect the game of baseball to be changed so you can play? In reality, it is not the developers responsibility. As another poster stated, its a player base issue, not a design flaw. You might even blame voice chat clients such as ventrillo as the cause if you really want. The fact is, as the challenge increases and groups play together, the third party use of voice communication has become almost standard. You cannot do anything about it. It is easier to give a verbal command while playing, than stopping just to type in commands, which can mean life or death in some game situations.
Life isnt fair, it never was and it never will be.
I ask this question because of a post I read on the World of Warcraft forums. A gamer who wanted to get into raiding was repeatively turned away by guilds because of his disability. Reason was because they require voice/audio participation while raiding. As much as this makes raiding easier, was it the right thing to do? Would you refuse to play ball with a deaf person because of increased communication issues? I wouldn't, but then that's me..
Where I'm going here is that back before there was the mass ability of raid chat, more raids were done with the use of text only.. I remember my days back in EQ and we only had text chat. Since those days audio chat has become common and widespread.. With this and the addition of automated addons, raiding has become easier and easier.. In my opinion, since audio chat made raids twice as easy to finish, the devs turned about and made the boss encounters twice as hard.. The problem here is that Devs are now designing and tailoring boss encounters with the use of audio chat. Is this the right thing to do?
In my opinion, all encounters in a game should be designed without the influence of 3rd party programs, such as vent, teamspeak, etc or even addons.. I also believe that it's completely irresponsible for devs to ignore the needs of the deaf, or other physical issues. Lets have some compassion and not ignore gamers that are deaf because people thought it was the easier road to take.. If the use of Ventrilo makes a boss fight easier.. so be it.. lets not make boss fights so hard that it's almost impossible to beat without the use of audion chat.. Shame on you devs
Well herein lies the problem... if the guy is a shitty team member on top of being deaf... I wouldn't feel guilt tripped in bringing him in. I know a few disabled people and they can be dicks and stupid... just like everyone else.
I've gamed with many non-disabled people who were complete morons, and also with non-disabled people who used vent/teamspeak/chat just so they could hear themselves speak. I don't care how fucking stoned someone is, or hearing them say "LAWL", "NEWB", or bitching about what I need to do when I Know My Role with surgical precision. Like said above, with EQ there people KNEW what to do with minimal chat.... OOM medding, 2 inc, add, pop, TRAIN 2 ZONE!, hail a spectre, they didn't need to be fucking told by a tweenager screaming into the mic when to DPS or Heal.
To be honest... with all the add-ons out there for WoW it's not like he'd need someone to tell him what to do and when to do it if he's even remotely self-aware of what he's supposed to do and when to do it. But if he don't know how to play his class in a group, then I'm sorry I wouldn't want him in my group/raid either... deaf or not.
"There is only one thing of which I am certain, and that's nothing is certain."
You can gimp yourself by using only text chat to make all the people who don't want to use Vent (or are deaf) happy, or you can tell them to piss off and get the next person in line who actually wants to win.
Behold, the prime example of "Vent only" elitism.
The point I was trying to make is there's no reason not to be an elitist. By being a raging dickhead you get through the content faster and with less hassles, and since there's no community to speak of you never face any negative consequences of such an attitude.
Keep in mind it's not just your raid leader, he just happens the be the one with enough balls to be a raging dickhead to your face - those other 23 guys in the who raid who do nothing tacitly support him.
So you need to ba a raging dickhead in order to succeed? Seriously?
In all my alliances, if we came across someone who had a disability, we did whatever we could to help out because we know theres people like you out there. When I used to play WoW, our main healer was deaf, and that dude was an absolute animal when it came to the big raids. I never saw anyone do a better job than that guy.
Besides, if a game becomes something where you will become less of a human being in order to win, thats just pathetic.
Somebody call the ACLU! Sue the game makers to force them to provide chat programs that convert verbal to text and text to verbal for free or get sued to hell and back!
Roses are red Violets are blue The reviewer has a mishapen head Which means his opinion is skewed ...Aldous.MF'n.Huxley
Somebody call the ACLU! Sue the game makers to force them to provide chat programs that convert verbal to text and text to verbal for free or get sued to hell and back!
There already is a kid who tried to sue Sony because he's blind and they aren't making a game to suit him.
If you have one arm, do you expect the game of baseball to be changed so you can play?
It doesn't have to be. Pete Gray did just fine. The mere idea that somebody would have to have both arms to play baseball, now that's the thing I'd expect to be changed.
Just like the idea that *you must* be in Vent is something I'd disagree with. Is it helpful? Sure. But given the number of people I've had who can barely be understood in Vent, it's not always great.
The number one reason I stay or leave a game is whether the community demands voice chat or not.
Personally, I don't want tohave to talk to strangers online just to do content. Never had to before, and frankly, the games are so simple now I don't really see the point.
I think it's also unfair for people who can't play without voice to be forced to type simply because some won't consent to wear a headset...about as unfair as it is to demand that everybody puts a headset in their ears.
However, the solution to this problem is just so simple, I'm surprised someone hasn't done it yet.
Reserve some servers for vent-only users, some for teamspeak only users, and some for text only. That way, everybody can game with people who use their voice preference.
__________________________ "Its sad when people use religion to feel superior, its even worse to see people using a video game to do it." --Arcken
"...when it comes to pimping EVE I have little restraints." --Hellmar, CEO of CCP.
"It's like they took a gun, put it to their nugget sack and pulled the trigger over and over again, each time telling us how great it was that they were shooting themselves in the balls." --Exar_Kun on SWG's NGE
I love the glib morally barren "life isn't fair so get used to it" brigade and dogmatic impulsive types who immediately start foaming at the mouth over "political correctness" whenever, god forbid, anyone suggests treating people with disabilities fairly." Political correctness" was once an appropiate concept to criticise liberal dogmatism, but is now is so over-used and mis-used as a term of knee-jerk pub bore idiocy that it is now practically meaningless as a critical term. The minute you suggest thinking of others or treating others fairly or trying to be more inclusive then you get some dumb ass accusing you of being a bleeding heart politcally correct type. Sigh, this gets me in rant mode lol.
The issue of treating people with disabilities fairly isn't about being left-wing or right-wing, conservative or liberal, or politically correct or incorrect; some things are but this ain't one of them. This is about growing up and not being a selfish self-absorbed prick. This is about being a decent human being, regardless of your political persuasion (and I AM a conservative by the way).
Anyone or any group that discriminates against a deaf person in an online game because they cannot use voice are really quite nasty, ignorant and terrible human beings. Those WOW guilds that turned down the deaf person should be named and shamed. I would have all those guilds on perma-ignore.
The only point I would disagree with the OP on is the suggestion of making boss fights easier. Most deaf people do NOT want that. I know the OPs heart is in the right place, but easy-mode for deaf people is patronizing and wrong. What they want is not to be turned down by ignorant guilds who are dogmatic in the extreme about everyone using voice. Not everyone needs to be on ventrilo for a raid to be successful and if someone has to type up bullet-point summary advice then you can easily make macros before the raid; this is what a decent and responsible human being who cares about his guildmates would do.
I see this as more of a community issue at the moment. But it is also in the devs best interest to consider how they can reasonably improve their service to as many player cohorts as possible, including those with disabilites.
Edit: This post is a response to both what I've been reading here and the original debate (referenced by the OP) on the WOW forums btw. Ninety percent of the posts on the WOW forums are really, really horrible btw, and several posters there disgustingly make jokes in very poor taste about deaf people. At least this forum is a little more grown up.
The number one reason I stay or leave a game is whether the community demands voice chat or not.
Personally, I don't want tohave to talk to strangers online just to do content. Never had to before, and frankly, the games are so simple now I don't really see the point.
I think it's also unfair for people who can't play without voice to be forced to type simply because some won't consent to wear a headset...about as unfair as it is to demand that everybody puts a headset in their ears.
However, the solution to this problem is just so simple, I'm surprised someone hasn't done it yet.
Reserve some servers for vent-only users, some for teamspeak only users, and some for text only. That way, everybody can game with people who use their voice preference.
It looks like most people missed my whole point of my post.. I guess I"ll take blame for that, and not imply we have reading comprehension problems.. anyways.. Beat, that is about as close to a solution as one can get, except that boss fights would have to be nerfed since the audio advantage is not present anymore. I saw many responses saying they have no problem playing with a deaf person and this is a community issue. This was not the point of this post. Lets rephrase this, would you continue to do raids if they were designed the old fashion way of no audio chat whatsoever.. period.. This means all 25 or 40 people turn their vents, teamspeak, etc OFF I think we all know the answer to this, and how most would respond.
The simple fact is that raiding over the years has become easier with the use of audio chat and 3rd party addons. Due to this, the devs tweaked their boss fights to make them harder to compensate. Take away your healbots, your dps macros, etc and see how well your raid performs The amount of wipes and failures would increase 2,000% and the outcry by the player base would be astronomical.
In anycase, this is not only a community issue, but a developer one as well.. It's their playground and if they design the playground to entice and allow misbehavior, then I hold them equal at fault Simple example would be a 9 year old playing football in the yard w/ porch light at 11pm. The child gets hurt because of poor vision. Who's fault is it?
Huh? Since when has sound been needed in an mmog? The basics of any mmo offer more than enough on-screen indication to know what is going on, hell every quest has always been text-based too, until just recently but i'm sure they will still offer subtitles.
I regularly play my games without even putting on my headphones and that's never created any problems, doing this pretty much does the same as if I were unable to hear.
So I guess I don't see the point to this discussion, even non-mmog's always offer subtitles, and more often than not you can't even turn them off lol.
((ok so I got a little sidetracked there, it's early, but very few people actually use vent/teamspeak or whatever, I don't know anyyone that wants to listen to some cocky kid(s) tell them how to play thier game, it's just a game, if some people can't type or handle someone else messing one thing up then they really shouldn't be PLAYING(this word seems to have lost it's meaning).))
I've actually played with a few deaf folks, in raiding and EVE pvp. In both cases, it wasn't exactly a detriment, and often someone who was an extremely fast typer, or maybe had a low priority job, would type out pertinent orders in the appropriate channel.
.
That's what i was thinking, why not just assign them a translator to type to him/her? Doesn't seem as though it would be that hard, or to much to ask. Then again thinking about the attitude of certain players who are always in a rush, it makes sense why a Deaf person may have issues in these games. One of my best friends growing up is deaf, we never had a problem with him keeping up (we never expected to), they're hearing imparied not retarded!
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
It looks like most people missed my whole point of my post.. I guess I"ll take blame for that, and not imply we have reading comprehension problems.. anyways.. Beat, that is about as close to a solution as one can get, except that boss fights would have to be nerfed since the audio advantage is not present anymore. I saw many responses saying they have no problem playing with a deaf person and this is a community issue. This was not the point of this post. Lets rephrase this, would you continue to do raids if they were designed the old fashion way of no audio chat whatsoever.. period.. This means all 25 or 40 people turn their vents, teamspeak, etc OFF I think we all know the answer to this, and how most would respond.
Well, I don't know about your answer, or anybody else's, but mine is...it wouldn't bother me one bit. Nor do I think it would negatively impact the raid in any actual terms. There may be people who insecurely rage-quit over not having a vent, but that would be *their* problem, not a problem with the content.
Why? Because I have yet to see people have better communication skills just because something was audio instead of text. Lots of folks don't listen, don't understand, and need to be taken through content at least a few times before they get it anyway. And once they do learn you don't have to tell them so much.
Accordingly, to me, Vent is mostly a crutch, and not a real essential part of raiding.
Especially since all the audio cues are easily handled in game without sound. I think they all are already, but I can't say that there are some that I never noticed were audio only.
I'm all for Braille computer screens and interfaces if it helps deaf people to play games.
This post is pure AWESOME, since braille is for blind people. Deaf folks have no problem reading, writing, or doing basic tasks. They just dont hear people complaining on Ventrilo. They also cant hear trains.
What should devs do to cater to deaf people? Create a tty type of voice chat system? If anything this is an issue that player communities should deal with considering the only problem a deaf person would have would be listening to voice chat. There's not much more a MMO developer can do but add subtitles and readable text.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Should Developers ignore deaf people when designing games?
Yes, they should. It's immoral to say this, but developers need to make their money. It's just too costly to redesign several features just to have them deaf-friendly. Games are made for the masses. Deaf people are a very small minority.
If you have one arm, do you expect the game of baseball to be changed so you can play?
It doesn't have to be. Pete Gray did just fine. The mere idea that somebody would have to have both arms to play baseball, now that's the thing I'd expect to be changed.
Just like the idea that *you must* be in Vent is something I'd disagree with. Is it helpful? Sure. But given the number of people I've had who can barely be understood in Vent, it's not always great.
I really do not see a problem with the "always be in vent" policies of guild. Most of the time you know before you join one or can find out by talking to it members leader if they have such a policy. There are also plenty of guilds with do not make a problem of this.
It is not a community problem. The only problem this community has it that it does not repect each others game style and "flame" others for wanting to play different to them (not directed at the quote!). WoW has 10 million people, pretty sure you can find at least 10.000 folks who are like minded then you. Even in smaller communities like Wurms Online you can find groups with will suit your game style.
Deaf people should be able to find a group of people who would have no problem playing with them in every MMO out there. People should embrace the difference instead of trying to force others to play there way. If you have a group who has vent only rule you either join vent, or move on to the next group!
Some activities require that you use certain senses. In video games, sight and sound is extremely important. If an mmo company has the resources and they want to reach audiences with disabilities, I think that's commendable but it shouldn't be mandatory.
The fact is there will always be things people with disabilities can not do. That's just life. Some people like the feel good mantra that there is nothing a disabled person can not do that a regular person can. Wrong. I work with the disabled all the time and see there limitations first hand. While we should accomodate them where we can, I have seen instances where companies that could not afford it had to close up shop rather than spend the thousands of dollars necessary to make their businesses handicap accessible. I would not put the same onus on game developers.
An application that translates vent conversations to text shouldn't be too hard to make. Have it read the raid leaders voice only and feed the text through an overlay display.
Shouldn't be too hard to program, it wouldn't be perfect, but it'd be better than typing.
Comments
People actually play with sound? I haven't turned my speakers on in two years. Who needs sound to play?
I don't see much evidence that developers actually are designing content around the use of VOIP. If anything I would say that content has generally become simpler and less challenging as the genre has developed.
Also, when it comes down to it, VOIP often doesn't make content any easier it is just more convenient. For most encounters the raid instructions can just as easily be macroed raid warnings, it just requires a bit more preparation.
Was more the case of my opinion that it was the OP was trying to state - that indeed developers were designing around VOIP and thus ignoring those that are deaf (or do not use VOIP) as such.
I agree more wtth content being dumbed down than it being designed around VOIP. Pretty soon games will be a case of logging in, getting a message telling us that we need to log back in "x" many times, and we will be rewarded with a shiny "I Win!" button...sigh.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Explorer: 87%, Killer: 67%, Achiever: 27%, Socializer: 20%
Captions are often in error, and that's usually done by a person. How good would you expect an automated system to be? A lot of people are barely understandable on vent as it is...
That said, WOW already has the bosses emote or otherwise show whatever they're going to do, and certainly addons like DBM do.
Any guild that couldn't find an accomodation for a deaf person, or somebody who couldn't use vent is...there own problem.
Me, I'd be glad to help them make it work.
This isn't a developer issue, this is a player base issue or the arrogance of one guild it seems. THere is nothing a developer or publisher can do to keep other players from being asses. If the WoW community doesn't offer a friendly enviroment for that player, i say that player say screw them and their game and join the dozens of other games with better communities and guilds.
parrotpholk-Because we all know the miracle patch fairy shows up the night before release and sprinkles magic dust on the server to make it allllll better.
If you have one arm, do you expect the game of baseball to be changed so you can play? In reality, it is not the developers responsibility. As another poster stated, its a player base issue, not a design flaw. You might even blame voice chat clients such as ventrillo as the cause if you really want. The fact is, as the challenge increases and groups play together, the third party use of voice communication has become almost standard. You cannot do anything about it. It is easier to give a verbal command while playing, than stopping just to type in commands, which can mean life or death in some game situations.
Life isnt fair, it never was and it never will be.
Well herein lies the problem... if the guy is a shitty team member on top of being deaf... I wouldn't feel guilt tripped in bringing him in. I know a few disabled people and they can be dicks and stupid... just like everyone else.
I've gamed with many non-disabled people who were complete morons, and also with non-disabled people who used vent/teamspeak/chat just so they could hear themselves speak. I don't care how fucking stoned someone is, or hearing them say "LAWL", "NEWB", or bitching about what I need to do when I Know My Role with surgical precision. Like said above, with EQ there people KNEW what to do with minimal chat.... OOM medding, 2 inc, add, pop, TRAIN 2 ZONE!, hail a spectre, they didn't need to be fucking told by a tweenager screaming into the mic when to DPS or Heal.
To be honest... with all the add-ons out there for WoW it's not like he'd need someone to tell him what to do and when to do it if he's even remotely self-aware of what he's supposed to do and when to do it. But if he don't know how to play his class in a group, then I'm sorry I wouldn't want him in my group/raid either... deaf or not.
"There is only one thing of which I am certain, and that's nothing is certain."
So you need to ba a raging dickhead in order to succeed? Seriously?
In all my alliances, if we came across someone who had a disability, we did whatever we could to help out because we know theres people like you out there. When I used to play WoW, our main healer was deaf, and that dude was an absolute animal when it came to the big raids. I never saw anyone do a better job than that guy.
Besides, if a game becomes something where you will become less of a human being in order to win, thats just pathetic.
Somebody call the ACLU! Sue the game makers to force them to provide chat programs that convert verbal to text and text to verbal for free or get sued to hell and back!
Roses are red
Violets are blue
The reviewer has a mishapen head
Which means his opinion is skewed
...Aldous.MF'n.Huxley
There already is a kid who tried to sue Sony because he's blind and they aren't making a game to suit him.
http://www.virtualworldsnews.com/2010/02/district-court-tosses-disabilities-suit-over-everquest.html
"There is only one thing of which I am certain, and that's nothing is certain."
It doesn't have to be. Pete Gray did just fine. The mere idea that somebody would have to have both arms to play baseball, now that's the thing I'd expect to be changed.
Just like the idea that *you must* be in Vent is something I'd disagree with. Is it helpful? Sure. But given the number of people I've had who can barely be understood in Vent, it's not always great.
The number one reason I stay or leave a game is whether the community demands voice chat or not.
Personally, I don't want tohave to talk to strangers online just to do content. Never had to before, and frankly, the games are so simple now I don't really see the point.
I think it's also unfair for people who can't play without voice to be forced to type simply because some won't consent to wear a headset...about as unfair as it is to demand that everybody puts a headset in their ears.
However, the solution to this problem is just so simple, I'm surprised someone hasn't done it yet.
Reserve some servers for vent-only users, some for teamspeak only users, and some for text only. That way, everybody can game with people who use their voice preference.
__________________________
"Its sad when people use religion to feel superior, its even worse to see people using a video game to do it."
--Arcken
"...when it comes to pimping EVE I have little restraints."
--Hellmar, CEO of CCP.
"It's like they took a gun, put it to their nugget sack and pulled the trigger over and over again, each time telling us how great it was that they were shooting themselves in the balls."
--Exar_Kun on SWG's NGE
I love the glib morally barren "life isn't fair so get used to it" brigade and dogmatic impulsive types who immediately start foaming at the mouth over "political correctness" whenever, god forbid, anyone suggests treating people with disabilities fairly." Political correctness" was once an appropiate concept to criticise liberal dogmatism, but is now is so over-used and mis-used as a term of knee-jerk pub bore idiocy that it is now practically meaningless as a critical term. The minute you suggest thinking of others or treating others fairly or trying to be more inclusive then you get some dumb ass accusing you of being a bleeding heart politcally correct type. Sigh, this gets me in rant mode lol.
The issue of treating people with disabilities fairly isn't about being left-wing or right-wing, conservative or liberal, or politically correct or incorrect; some things are but this ain't one of them. This is about growing up and not being a selfish self-absorbed prick. This is about being a decent human being, regardless of your political persuasion (and I AM a conservative by the way).
Anyone or any group that discriminates against a deaf person in an online game because they cannot use voice are really quite nasty, ignorant and terrible human beings. Those WOW guilds that turned down the deaf person should be named and shamed. I would have all those guilds on perma-ignore.
The only point I would disagree with the OP on is the suggestion of making boss fights easier. Most deaf people do NOT want that. I know the OPs heart is in the right place, but easy-mode for deaf people is patronizing and wrong. What they want is not to be turned down by ignorant guilds who are dogmatic in the extreme about everyone using voice. Not everyone needs to be on ventrilo for a raid to be successful and if someone has to type up bullet-point summary advice then you can easily make macros before the raid; this is what a decent and responsible human being who cares about his guildmates would do.
I see this as more of a community issue at the moment. But it is also in the devs best interest to consider how they can reasonably improve their service to as many player cohorts as possible, including those with disabilites.
Edit: This post is a response to both what I've been reading here and the original debate (referenced by the OP) on the WOW forums btw. Ninety percent of the posts on the WOW forums are really, really horrible btw, and several posters there disgustingly make jokes in very poor taste about deaf people. At least this forum is a little more grown up.
Regards
Melmoth
It looks like most people missed my whole point of my post.. I guess I"ll take blame for that, and not imply we have reading comprehension problems.. anyways.. Beat, that is about as close to a solution as one can get, except that boss fights would have to be nerfed since the audio advantage is not present anymore. I saw many responses saying they have no problem playing with a deaf person and this is a community issue. This was not the point of this post. Lets rephrase this, would you continue to do raids if they were designed the old fashion way of no audio chat whatsoever.. period.. This means all 25 or 40 people turn their vents, teamspeak, etc OFF
I think we all know the answer to this, and how most would respond.
The simple fact is that raiding over the years has become easier with the use of audio chat and 3rd party addons. Due to this, the devs tweaked their boss fights to make them harder to compensate. Take away your healbots, your dps macros, etc and see how well your raid performs
The amount of wipes and failures would increase 2,000% and the outcry by the player base would be astronomical.
In anycase, this is not only a community issue, but a developer one as well.. It's their playground and if they design the playground to entice and allow misbehavior, then I hold them equal at fault
Simple example would be a 9 year old playing football in the yard w/ porch light at 11pm. The child gets hurt because of poor vision. Who's fault is it?
I'm all for Braille computer screens and interfaces if it helps deaf people to play games.
Huh? Since when has sound been needed in an mmog? The basics of any mmo offer more than enough on-screen indication to know what is going on, hell every quest has always been text-based too, until just recently but i'm sure they will still offer subtitles.
I regularly play my games without even putting on my headphones and that's never created any problems, doing this pretty much does the same as if I were unable to hear.
So I guess I don't see the point to this discussion, even non-mmog's always offer subtitles, and more often than not you can't even turn them off lol.
((ok so I got a little sidetracked there, it's early, but very few people actually use vent/teamspeak or whatever, I don't know anyyone that wants to listen to some cocky kid(s) tell them how to play thier game, it's just a game, if some people can't type or handle someone else messing one thing up then they really shouldn't be PLAYING(this word seems to have lost it's meaning).))
Simple amswer? Yes.
Long answer? I have no time or need to write one.
I've been uplinked and downloaded, I've been inputted and outsourced. I know the upside of downsizing, I know the downside of upgrading.
I'm a high-tech low-life. A cutting-edge, state-of-the-art, bi-coastal multi-tasker, and I can give you a gigabyte in a nanosecond.
I'm new-wave, but I'm old-school; and my inner child is outward-bound.
I'm a hot-wired, heat-seeking, warm-hearted cool customer; voice-activated and bio-degradable.
RIP George Carlin.
That's what i was thinking, why not just assign them a translator to type to him/her? Doesn't seem as though it would be that hard, or to much to ask. Then again thinking about the attitude of certain players who are always in a rush, it makes sense why a Deaf person may have issues in these games. One of my best friends growing up is deaf, we never had a problem with him keeping up (we never expected to), they're hearing imparied not retarded!
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Well, I don't know about your answer, or anybody else's, but mine is...it wouldn't bother me one bit. Nor do I think it would negatively impact the raid in any actual terms. There may be people who insecurely rage-quit over not having a vent, but that would be *their* problem, not a problem with the content.
Why? Because I have yet to see people have better communication skills just because something was audio instead of text. Lots of folks don't listen, don't understand, and need to be taken through content at least a few times before they get it anyway. And once they do learn you don't have to tell them so much.
Accordingly, to me, Vent is mostly a crutch, and not a real essential part of raiding.
Especially since all the audio cues are easily handled in game without sound. I think they all are already, but I can't say that there are some that I never noticed were audio only.
This post is pure AWESOME, since braille is for blind people. Deaf folks have no problem reading, writing, or doing basic tasks. They just dont hear people complaining on Ventrilo. They also cant hear trains.
Thanks for making me happy inside :-)
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@ the post above LOL.
What should devs do to cater to deaf people? Create a tty type of voice chat system? If anything this is an issue that player communities should deal with considering the only problem a deaf person would have would be listening to voice chat. There's not much more a MMO developer can do but add subtitles and readable text.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Yes, they should. It's immoral to say this, but developers need to make their money. It's just too costly to redesign several features just to have them deaf-friendly. Games are made for the masses. Deaf people are a very small minority.
I really do not see a problem with the "always be in vent" policies of guild. Most of the time you know before you join one or can find out by talking to it members leader if they have such a policy. There are also plenty of guilds with do not make a problem of this.
It is not a community problem. The only problem this community has it that it does not repect each others game style and "flame" others for wanting to play different to them (not directed at the quote!). WoW has 10 million people, pretty sure you can find at least 10.000 folks who are like minded then you. Even in smaller communities like Wurms Online you can find groups with will suit your game style.
Deaf people should be able to find a group of people who would have no problem playing with them in every MMO out there. People should embrace the difference instead of trying to force others to play there way. If you have a group who has vent only rule you either join vent, or move on to the next group!
Some activities require that you use certain senses. In video games, sight and sound is extremely important. If an mmo company has the resources and they want to reach audiences with disabilities, I think that's commendable but it shouldn't be mandatory.
The fact is there will always be things people with disabilities can not do. That's just life. Some people like the feel good mantra that there is nothing a disabled person can not do that a regular person can. Wrong. I work with the disabled all the time and see there limitations first hand. While we should accomodate them where we can, I have seen instances where companies that could not afford it had to close up shop rather than spend the thousands of dollars necessary to make their businesses handicap accessible. I would not put the same onus on game developers.
An application that translates vent conversations to text shouldn't be too hard to make. Have it read the raid leaders voice only and feed the text through an overlay display.
Shouldn't be too hard to program, it wouldn't be perfect, but it'd be better than typing.
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