God of War Ragnarök will reportedly have improved accessibility features, which include subtitles and controller options.
One of the biggest games of the year, God of War Ragnarök will be one of the most accessible games released. In a blog post, Playstation and Santa Monica studios said they’re bringing in accessibility options from the first God Of War game, which was released in 2018 and the PC version as well as developing some new ones.
These include controller mapping, which allows the player to choose from pre-set ones or create their own and better subtitle options. The player can now choose the subtitle sizes as well as colours to aid with reading the dialogue. The player can also choose to show or hide the speaker names, something that the first game also had.
Another exciting addition is the option to add colour to enemies and other targets. The high contrast mode will help to make key characters more visible to players against the background. Ragnarök is expected to release later this year for Playstation 4 and 5, but no official date has been set.
Accessibility in gaming has been a hot topic for years and we’re finally seeing some improvements. Most entertainment industries dedicate their products and experiences to able-bodied users, but the team behind God Of War are showing just how accessible games can be. The blog post also teases that there are more accessibility features to come
Elden Ring, possibly the biggest game release of 2022 so far, has caused plenty of controversy for its difficulty settings, or for the lack of them to be precise. Some gamers argue that games like Elden Ring are supposed to be challenging and to include an easy mode to them is an insult of sorts.
But for many disabled gamers (or gamers like me, who are just useless with a controller in general), the easy mode and accessibility features allow us to enjoy the game and not be completely excluded from the experience.
While there certainly is a sense of community within those who beat games such as Elden Ring, which is notoriously difficult, it’s not exactly away from them to make a game more accessible. God Of War Ragnarök seems to be leading the way in terms of making gaming inclusive and available to everyone, regardless of experience or disability.
