I Consulted on Accessibility for Life is Strange: Double Exposure

So, this is something I have been bursting at the seams to talk about for a while. I worked as an accessibility consultant on Life is Strange: Double Exposure.

This is my first credit as an accessibility consultant for a major video game. Or it will be, my name’s not in the credits today, but it will be soon. The joy of getting credit sorted as an outside contributor haha.

So, a little background. Around three years ago, in September 2021, I published an episode of Access-Ability in which I reviewed the accessibility support seen in Life is Strange: True Colours. Alongside that accessibility review video, I also ended up following up with the studio to talk about the fact that by not including song lyrics or even song names in their captions, certain scenes in the game were made inaccessible for deaf players, or those playing with the game otherwise muted. The latter got a bit of news coverage at the time from sites like The Gamer.

Jumping forward in time a little, in early 2023 I was invited by Square Enix to take part in an accessibility roundtable for a then unannounced game project, alongside some other accessibility consultants. While I won’t detail what I saw during that meeting while under NDA, I feel there are a few small anecdotes I can probably share fairly safely. I was told that it was going to be a new Life is Strange game, I learned about what the new parallel reality hopping mechanic was going to be, I was able to guess from context that Max Caufield would be returning as the main character, and perhaps most excitingly I got to see my Access-Ability episode about True Colours cited in an official internal accessibility planning document that a company had been using to cite things that they could improve, why they were important, and how they could act on those improvements.

I’ve been a huge fan of the Life is Strange series since its first ever instalment. Despite criticisms I’ve had over the years, such as a piece that I wrote for Polygon about episode 2 of the original series gamifying talking someone down from a suicide attempt, I cannot deny how much this series means to me personally. I’ve loved these games for years, and knowing that a video that I published with fewer than 2,000 views managed to reach the development team, and be used as a reference point for how to improve accessibility in the series going forward, was hugely meaningful to hear.

In the four years I’ve been publishing weekly accessibility videos and articles online, I’ve from time to time been told about impacts that I’ve had on game development. I was recently told by someone at an awards event for example that one of my videos was instrumental in arguing why their boss shouldn’t cut a feature that they were working on. A lot of the time I don’t get to share publicly the news that I had an impact on a game. A lot of the time my impacts are through a degree of separation from the studio. Getting to say that one of my videos led directly to consulting work means so much to me.

It can be disheartening to work on a video series that struggles to gain mainstream viewer numbers. Sometimes, I look at video views on Access-Ability episodes and wonder whether the work that I do is making an impact. Getting to consult on Double Exposure was one of the first times I got really firm reassurance that the work I was doing mattered.

Impact over numbers – my episodes didn’t need huge numbers of views to have a chance at making the games I love more accessible in the future.

However, I feel it is important to give a caveat to my excitement.

Back in April of 2024, IGN published an article detailing a number of issues at Deck Nine, the developer of Double Exposure. To oversimplify a lengthy article which I will link in the video description, Deck Nine at one point had an issue with at least one person trying to sneak Nazi dogwhistles into art assets in the game. When this was brought up to management, it was reportedly not taken seriously as an issue. Furthermore, one of the higher ups at the studio reportedly showed a pattern of racism, sexism, and general bigotry. For a studio producing games with strong queer themes, this was obviously disappointing to hear.

While I have not played through Life is Strange: Double Exposure yet at the time of recording this video, episodes 1 and 2 are available in early access but I’ve prioritised getting this video up as quickly as possible upon release, I have been told off the record about certain characters and plot beats in the game that do reassure me that there are an overwhelming number of people at Deck Nine fighting to make the Life is Strange series progressive, and they’re not going down without a fight. I cannot speak for the execution yet, but I am reassured that the stories of bigotry at the studio are ultimately not reflective of the studio’s resulting work output.

Additionally, as mentioned at the start, I’m not currently credited for my work on Double Exposure in the game’s two chapter preview, and neither are the other consultants I worked alongside. This is not a result of malice. Without delving into specifics, I can see how this came to happen, and am in the process of seeing it rectified. I have been assured I’ll appear in the game’s credits, hopefully by the time we see the full release of the game’s remaining chapters in two weeks time.

This is likely to be my first formal game credit as an accessibility consultant on a known name game series, and I am incredibly excited to be able to share that news.

I obviously can’t provide a traditional accessibility review for the game, given that I worked on the game as a consultant and therefore have a conflict of interest. If you want to hear some of my opinions and thoughts, I’ll likely give those on the next episode of Ctrl, Alt, Access, the gaming accessibility video and audio podcast that I host with my good friend Arevya. I’ll give the caveat of my involvement in development, before sharing more conversationally my thoughts on the end resulting game. I want to keep my opinions for now separated into somewhere less likely to be misinterpreted as a dedicated review, given my involvement.

I will however quickly list here some of the features present in the finished game at first glance, just as an informal rundown for those wanting to know accessibility support ahead of the official standard edition release in two weeks.

Life is Strange: Double Exposure features a dedicated accessibility menu, available in its current two chapter preview. Players can increase the length of choice timers, turn on camera assist to automatically have the camera in a fixed position behind Max during movement, turn off camera shake effects, simplify power effect visuals, turn on confirmations before major choices, toggle options to skip gameplay sequences, and activate hotspot pinging options to help identify interactable objects in scenes.

There’s also content warnings in the game, separated by categories. Players can select the topics that they would benefit from content warnings for, and choose whether to have an on screen warning appear in real time during gameplay, or if the game should pause when a prompt appears to allow the player to pause until they’re ready to tackle the specific topic.

But yeah, after nearly two years, I can finally tell you that I worked on Life is Strange: Double Exposure. I’m a credited accessibility consultant on a game series that people recognise. I got to take part in shaping a game series that I love, and I couldn’t be more hyped to get to say that.