How our next game, ChromaGun 2, remains accessible with its color-based mechanics!
ChromaGun 2 is our next release - it's a first-person puzzle shooter, with mechanics based on a gun that shoots paint!
Essentially, you use the ChromaGun to color walls and littler worker droids in order to activate triggers and open doors. Droids are attracted to walls of the same color. And eventually, the player will need to mix primary colors to properly solve the puzzles. It sounds simple, but begins to increase in difficulty as new mechanics are introduced.
Here's the issue. If you have any form of color-blindness. This becomes noticeably more difficult and far less enjoyable.
It doesn't matter what form of color blindness you have. They all affect the core of the game, which makes using a filter or color-correction impractical; in order to compensate all forms of color-blindness, we'll need a different solution.
[Quick overview of forms of color-blindness by the NIH]
So how did we solve this?
We assign each primary color an easily distinguishable symbol.
Triangle for yellow, straight line for red, and circle for blue! It is imperative that they're easily distinguishable. Both because it needs to be easy to tell the colors apart, and because they need to still be distinguishable when they mix together.
How does color mixing function?
See the gif above - when primaries are mixed, the shapes are combined together to create their own distinct symbols, allowing the user to put together the combination without needing the extra context of color.
Firstly, in the bottom-right corner of the screen, right next to the ChromaGun. This indicates what color is currently "equipped."
Secondly, they appear layered over colored WorkerDroids.
Thirdly, they appear dead-center on the surface of paintable walls.
Lastly, they appear on tertiary puzzle objects like boxes, vents, and other colorables! (see barrel above, for example)
Where can this be activated?
Currently, it can be toggled in the settings in the gameplay section of the main menu!
It has in fact been tested, and was successful in the titles predecessor, ChromaGun.
During my time at the Berlin Games Ground, I left the color blind mode active after a user mentioned they had difficulty seeing the colors. I thought ah, perfect! I can see our games feature in action. And.. it worked well! They immediately said everything made so much more sense, and in regards to the symbols, said that they appreciate that we used them rather than a filter.
Also, many non-colorblind players thought they were just a natural part of the game, as I left them on. So they're both functional, subtle, and visually pleasing.
Accessibility is a core part of modern game design, and the inclusion of these features is imperative to the enjoyment of a game, especially when core mechanics are involved.
We don't want to exclude anyone from playing our game! Thanks for reading, and I hope you found this log interesting, and maybe even useful (especially if you're a fellow indie dev ;) )!
Iffff u wanna test it out, check out our steam page! We're currently preparing to do playtests! If your interested, let me know! (Email or dm!)
