Vision Impairments

When we made the decision to make FREEQ accessible, we knew we were in over our heads.  We were not vision-impaired, and we didn’t know anyone who was, so we were bound to miss a lot of things.  However, we DID have the contact info of a small, passionate group of people who both knew about the game and wanted to make it accessible—the folks who’d complained to us in the first place.  We reached out to them, telling them that we were willing but only maybe able, and asked for their help.

The response was immediate, and enthusiastic.  Within a day or two of sending out feeler emails, we had assembled a core group of players who were willing to assist in any way they could.  They provided feedback on our proposed usability retrofit, helped with bug testing, and got the word out to their friends that the game was coming.

As release day drew near, our testers told us about AppleVis, an online forum dedicated to reviewing iOS and Mac applications’ accessibility.  We created an account and started poking around, and sure enough, there was a review of FREEQ, with a big old “NOT EVEN REMOTELY ACCESSIBLE” grade on it.  We knew that if we were going to get the word out that FREEQ was accessible and available, this was the place to do it.  So we responded in the bad review’s comments, apologizing for our ignorance and promising a fix.

Jeffrey Meisner, technet.com

verizon.com

Barcham, the-riotact.com