Personally I think everyone in this world should be treated evenly. Doesn’t matter if you’re handicapped, look different, or even Deaf. I’ve been told many times by my teacher that he’s proud to be Deaf and finds it odd that people feel bad for him because most of the time they don’t know much about Deaf culture. Before I took an ASL class I didn’t know much about Deaf culture either but now I’m more educated and understand that their lives aren’t any different from ours. This is why I want to share what I love doing in my spare time the most, playing games. I feel as if I can escape my real world pains and troubles to enter a virtual world that I can do pretty much anything I like to do when I play games. There are endless possibilities of different games out there that developers share with consumers. I’m sure Deaf people face hard times in their lives just like hearing people do too and I’d like to share with the Deaf community how I escape from times like that.
Playing games can be fun, competitive, or just plain relaxing depending on the kind of game you’re playing. There are many genres in games, some of them are adventure, action, strategy, and role-playing. Being able to play the game is the main part of the problem. Some games are just not hearing impaired friendly. Imagine wanting to play a game that really interests you but not being able to because of being Deaf, it can be a little disappointing. That is why more and more developers are starting to focus on the Deaf community. There are over 20 million people that are Deaf in the United States which makes up for about 8.6% of the total population. (Gaming with an Auditory Disability, 2006) When games started out it was much simpler and easier to play as there were texts everywhere instead of voice. I remember when I played Super Nintendo, there wasn’t a single voice or word said in any of the games, there were a lot of reading to be done. This was good in many ways, one of them is the Deaf community won’t have a problem playing games. Another reason is it creates an education system for kids learning how to read also while they’re enjoying their games, however with technology growing so quickly, more games are becoming based on voices rather than texts. This advancement in games is making it easier for hearing people and harder for the Deaf community. However there are more game companies trying to implement facial expressions and actual sign language into the game. (Tol, 2006) This proves that even though technology is making it harder for the Deaf community, it can also make it easier as well.
There are also many websites out there that are made just specially for Deaf gamers. For example, DeafGamers is a website dedicated to making decision on what games are hearing impaired friendly and what games to avoid. With this website it has helped a lot of Deaf gamers find the right game that they want to play without finding out the hard way themselves. They review games and show a rating for how it caters to Deaf people. They rate the games A through E, A being the most Deaf friendly game and E being the worst and hardest to play for Deaf people. Also another source I found was a facebook group page that somebody started to unite Deaf gamers so they can play together. The link can be found by clicking here.
One of the gaming companies is taking a lot of action to cater to the Deaf community, that company is Valve. You might know this game company from their famous title, Half-Life and Half-Life 2. Gabe Newell, founder of Valve, conducted a meeting with Deaf gamers to find out what are the issues the Deaf community is facing in games and to improve those issues. Valve animators also studied the participants’ facial expression and movements. (Valve Research, 2009) They’re talking about incorporating sign language into stealth games, which sounds very interesting and fun to me, especially after I’ve learned a lot in my ASL class. I think it’ll be quite the experience to play that game when I understand ASL more. I’ve also included a link to the Youtube meeting Gabe Newell had here:
I was surprised by the strong community in Deaf gaming, I found so many websites that are very helpful for Deaf gamers. I had no idea the community was that strong for gamers. I’m very excited to know that gaming companies are taking action to make games friendlier towards the Deaf community. I can’t wait to see what the future has in store for the Deaf community.
Sources:
"Gaming with an Auditory Disability." Game Accessibility. Stichting Bartiméus Accessibility, 2006. Web. 10 May 2010.
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