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We’re still in Disability Pride Month, and as such I wanted to use today’s episode of Access-Ability to spend some time highlighting other creators in the video game accessibility space who are doing great work, and are worth following if you find value in this series, and are interested in other perspectives on the topics we cover here.
I will be focusing today on people who are public facing content creators, organisations, and critics, but I would love to in future create a follow up video discussing people working directly within game development studios in official roles on accessibility, as their contributions equally deserve recognition, but are sometimes less visible.
As a disabled gamer and accessibility critic, I love what I do, but I recognise I am only one perspective on a broad and complicated subject, and want to share some of the people whose work in this space inspires me to do what I do.
Links to all creators mentioned will be available in the video description.
First up, I want to give a big shout out to the folks at Can I Play That, a website dedicated to accessibility reviews, news coverage on accessibility focused topics, and whose work expands beyond public facing coverage. They host a robust database cataloguing video game accessibility for a wide number of titles, provide developers with accessibility best practice reference guides, and do work directly with game developers assessing accessibility in titles, and educating on how games and their developers can be more broadly and consistently accessible for disabled players.
As someone who has been doing accessibility in gaming coverage for the past three years, Can I Play That has been a consistently useful resource, not only for keeping up to date on news, but also for learning from perspectives beyond my own. Every one of their writers are worth following, as they do superb work, but I’d particularly like to shout out Marijn, whose work I have recently cited on this show.
Moving on to some recommendations for specific creators to follow, Grant Stoner is an accessibility journalist who regularly publishes very high quality pieces on IGN. Grant’s work is always insightful, and manages to be accessible to a mainstream audience that may not be hugely versed on accessibility topics.
Arevya is a disabled content creator and variety streamer who produces lovely wholesome online content, while talking frankly and openly about disability topics.
Tarja Porkka-Kontturi is an accessibility consultant who has talked about the ways that being autistic, and having chronic illness, can be a barrier to video game events, and the ways that these sorts of events could be moving toward being more accessible in future, which are really important conversations for our industry to be having.
SightlessKombat is a gamer without sight, and accessibility consultant who I first discovered by watching his gameplay videos playing the Last of Us 2 based solely on audio cues. His work directly on games has included working on the upcoming Stories of Blossom, a point and click adventure game with audio descriptions, designed with sightless players in mind.
QueerlyBee is an autistic disabled content creator, whose cosy and comfy Twitch streams are always really wonderful and welcoming to tune into. An easy recommendation in this space, for certain.
Vivek Gohil is a gamer with Duchenne muscular dystrophy, who has done a lot to open my eyes to some of the specifics of gaming hardware accessibility, and how games can best support gamers with specific physical accessibility needs.
Brandon Cole is a blind accessibility consultant, who is currently working with the developers of the upcoming Forza Motorsport to make the racing sim series accessible to sightless blind players. His work is looking like it could help take a huge step forward for accessibility in the technical racing genre, and is hugely exciting to see unfold.
Joanna Blakhart is perhaps best known in the accessibility space for having worked on the high quality content warnings implementation seen in indie magic school RPG Ikenfell, but more broadly works hard behind the scenes to fight for improved accessibility and inclusivity in games, and is well worth a follow if you are invested in improvements in this space.
Steve Spohn is the senior director at a charity called Able Gamers, which focuses on increasing access to accessible gaming setups, and creating community events for disabled gamers to connect, and try out tools that may be a good fit for their specific needs. Steve does amazing work for the community, and Able Gamers is a vital part of the video game accessibility ecosystem.
On a similar note, UK based charity SpecialEffect has for years been doing wonderful work creating custom accessibility controllers for disabled gamers. Their work began in an era before mass produced accessibility controllers were widely available, and today their work continues to be instrumental in creating bespoke solutions to keep gamers playing the games they love.
Mollie Evans is a disabled content creator who, this month, is busy organising a series of accessibility focused roundtable discussions on Twitch covering a wide variety of topics. I can’t say enough positive things about her work, particularly as it relates to bringing other people into discussions of accessibility.
Indie Gamer Chick is a gamer with epilepsy, whose advice was pivotal in my understanding of how to properly discuss photosensitivity accessibility options in video games, and broadness of photosensitivity as a topic.
Radderss is a Twitch streamer and accessibility advocate, with chronic fatigue syndrome, Sjogrens, and fibromyalgia. She has fostered a really welcoming community around her work, and does a great job normalising discussions of accessibility in gaming.
Antonio Martínez is a gamer with Spinal Muscular Atrophy type 3, and acts as both Editor In Chief and Mobility Editor for GameA11yNexus, a wonderful website focused on covering accessibility in video games, as well as accessible hardware developments, that is well worth keeping up to date with if you want to follow gaming accessibility news. He’s joined there by Low vision Editor Victor Branco, and Hard of Hearing editor Nickie Harper-Williams.
Steve Saylor is a blind gamer and accessibility consultant, and was one of the first accessibility focused content creators whose work I came across online several years ago. He is an incredibly confident and friendly on camera presenter and host, whose work is always incredibly well produced as well as informative.
Ian Hamilton is an accessibility specialist who runs the Gaming Accessibility Conference every year, and who plays a major role in bringing game developers and disabled gamers together into discussions that are instrumental to improving the state of our industry.
DeafGamersTV is a deaf, diabetic gamer and accessibility consultant who not only creates hugely informative content, but is also just great fun to watch if you enjoy competitive fighting game content.
IllegallySighted is another talented blind accessibility consultant, who provides valuable insights on gaming with low vision.
Roll with Ru is a queer disabled content creator, who covers among other topics physical accessibility barriers that are really important to consider for any gaming events taking place as in person events.
TheOakenForest is an accessibility consultant currently working on the Forza series, but who is also notable for their work on the BSL Gaming Glossary, a database aiming to comprehensively chronicle all British Sign Language gaming terminology, in order to improve consistency in gaming specific BSL.
AwkwardishPanda is a cozy crafting Twitch streamer who discusses accessibility, particularly as it related to becoming disabled as a result of a sudden accident, and the impact that has had on their physical ability when gaming
HelloItsKolo is a UK based disabled Twitch partner and accessibility consultant, as well as a SpecialEffect charity ambassador.
ChiChiStreams is an autistic streamer and Twitch Partner who focuses on soft and gentle games, with very welcoming content and a strong intersectional focus.
I am certain there are creators today who I am forgetting to mention, and I will probably end up doing a follow up video to this one in the near future to discuss other wonderful creators who I would recommend following. The joys of ADHD – focusing and remembering are not my strongest suits.
But there’s also probably other wonderful accessibility focused content creators out there I am simply not yet aware of, so please leave me your recommendations of people to follow down in the comments, as I would love to recommend even more creators in a future video.
Accessibility in video games is a wonderfully wide field, and I love seeing what other disabled gamers have to say on accessibility topics. If you enjoy the work I do, please check out everyone listed in this video, as these creators and organisations are well worth your time and attention.
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