Colourblind gamers and developers ignorance in programming

Is it reasonable to expect a web developer to code in such a manner when an end user can employee custom CSS or disability modes at their own end to accommodate their needs?

Yes I am playing the devil's advocate here somewhat but surely the reasonableness of a claim should take into account BOTH parties involved.

One could argue that a simple change on the end users part which can SPECIFICALLY address their own individual needs is a better solution. A web developer would have to accommodate every possible scenario, rather unreasonable I would think.

When I web dev I do not underline links. End of really. It's not a "screw you" decision it's one of aesthetics and how I want the page to look. If you want underlined links you CAN if you so wish re-enable them at an end user level.
 
Sin_Chase said:
Is it reasonable to expected a web developer to code in such a manner when an end user can employee custom CSS or disability modes at their own end to accommodate their needs?

Yes I am playing the devil's advocate here somewhat but surely the reasonableness of a claim should take into account BOTH parties involved.
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It's possible to hard code styles into a webpage though, using font tags and stuff which were all the rage back in the day. The point of the DDA for web accessibility was to make coders leave that behind in favour of a stylesheet. That way if the user didn't like your colour scheme, they can go for a black and white version or something.

That's all James is really asking. The ability to change it himself if it doesn't suit him instead of having stuff hardcoded by a developer.
 
Sin_Chase said:
Is it reasonable to expect a web developer to code in such a manner when an end user can employee custom CSS or disability modes at their own end to accommodate their needs?

Yes I am playing the devil's advocate here somewhat but surely the reasonableness of a claim should take into account BOTH parties involved.

One could argue that a simple change on the end users part which can SPECIFICALLY address their own individual needs is a better solution. A web developer would have to accommodate every possible scenario, rather unreasonable I would think.

When I web dev I do not underline links. End of really. It's not a "screw you" decision it's one of aesthetics and how I want the page to look. If you want underlined links you CAN if you so wish re-enable them at an end user level.
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Not having people distinguish between red and green (i.e green = ally, red = enemy) would solve almost all of the problems to be honest. Red and blue work much better than red and green.
 
I'd also use examples of games too, I mean it's unrealistic of anyone to expect something like Beat Hazard to be fine for colourblind people, with games like that it's always going to be luck of the draw, but for team or faction based games, I certainly don't think it's unreasonable to allow the user to change the default team colours.

In the example of beat hazard, the game would still be playable if you are colourblind because you can see the shapes moving so you can work out roughly what's bad and what's not. It's not perfect, but it's still playable.

If for example he plays TF2, how's he meant to know which team that spy is on, and to make it worse they use effects like fire - putting a red effect on a blue player just messes things up more. In that case it seriously affects his ability to play the game and considering that it literally is just 2 hardcoded colour values somewhere, it's not unreasonable to change that. I mean if indie games like Minecraft, Terraria and Magicka allow you to change your skin / colour of your robes etc, then why on earth aren't the big games doing it.
 
soullessfire said:
I'd also use examples of games too, I mean it's unrealistic of anyone to expect something like Beat Hazard to be fine for colourblind people, with games like that it's always going to be luck of the draw, but for team or faction based games, I certainly don't think it's unreasonable to allow the user to change the default team colours.

In the example of beat hazard, the game would still be playable if you are colourblind because you can see the shapes moving so you can work out roughly what's bad and what's not. It's not perfect, but it's still playable.

If for example he plays TF2, how's he meant to know which team that spy is on, and to make it worse they use effects like fire - putting a red effect on a blue player just messes things up more. In that case it seriously affects his ability to play the game and considering that it literally is just 2 hardcoded colour values somewhere, it's not unreasonable to change that. I mean if indie games like Minecraft, Terraria and Magicka allow you to chance your skin and colour of your robes, then why on earth aren't the big games doing it.
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You can actually use custom skins on TF2. For players, weapons, particle effects etc.
 
soullessfire said:
I'd also use examples of games too, I mean it's unrealistic of anyone to expect something like Beat Hazard to be fine for colourblind people, with games like that it's always going to be luck of the draw, but for team or faction based games, I certainly don't think it's unreasonable to allow the user to change the default team colours.

In the example of beat hazard, the game would still be playable if you are colourblind because you can see the shapes moving so you can work out roughly what's bad and what's not. It's not perfect, but it's still playable.

If for example he plays TF2, how's he meant to know which team that spy is on, and to make it worse they use effects like fire - putting a red effect on a blue player just messes things up more. In that case it seriously affects his ability to play the game and considering that it literally is just 2 hardcoded colour values somewhere, it's not unreasonable to change that. I mean if indie games like Minecraft, Terraria and Magicka allow you to change your skin / colour of your robes etc, then why on earth aren't the big games doing it.
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I think you are over simplifying it. It's not just a colour variable. In games like TF2 the whole GAME is designed around the faction colours. Level design for example is orientated around faction colours. So it's not just models, it's that also.

Not to mention the faction names contain Red and Blue :p:D
 
Sin_Chase said:
I think you are over simplifying it. It's not just a colour variable. In games like TF2 the whole GAME is designed around the faction colours. Level design for example is orientated around faction colours. So it's not just models, it's that also.

Not to mention the faction names contain Red and Blue :p:D
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Yeah but the level, even the control points and the carts aren't vitally important, you could just learn the start points for those and live with it.

TF2 isn't the best example, it's just in my head because my friend had issues with it last week and I've been playing it a lot recently.

Valve released the game to modders at the same time as going F2P, so like H2F Scott said (which TBH I didn't know) skins and stuff like that will probably become the norm and remove the problem.
 
I can't speak for everyone but I don't have any problems with TF2 regarding colourblindness except for the small jarate problem. Red and blue teams is actually perfect for me, they're the easiest colours to distinguish. TF2 is one of the very few fps games I can take seriously because of the fact it's red and blue. I've never been able to play graphically realistic looking games (Bafflefield, Call of Duty, etc) because I can't distinguish enemy players from the background lol.
 
EVH said:
Red, green and blue?! That's rough.

I imagine most games look greyscale :/
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Not really. I'm also red/green/blue colour-blind but there are degrees of colour-blindness.

Mine is more towards the blue end. I have some problems with borwns/greens/reds but have a bigger problem with blue/purple/pink.

To be honest after 36 years of living with it I don't find it a problem apart from the odd time I mess acolour up or in games where you can't change the colours. Thankfully most games do have an option.
 
soullessfire said:
Valve released the game to modders at the same time as going F2P, so like H2F Scott said (which TBH I didn't know) skins and stuff like that will probably become the norm and remove the problem.
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Skins for TF2 have been available since long before it becoming F2P, probably since release.
 
You can probably patch some stuff. In CoD4 I can make all the colours of the enemy team/our team/scores etc. different by making (stealing someone elses and slightly editing) a config. At the end of the day, in the game files, surely it says that certain text should come up as red on the screen, you could make it a colour to suit you?

As someone else said, might sound harsh but I think it's something you may need to work around rather than games companies working around you, especially as it sounds like you have it quite bad.
 
James J said:
Lets take frozen synpase as another prime example. I can't honestly tell the difference between either side due to the **** colour scheme used in the game and there appears to be no option to change it after a bit of internet digging. Due to that, I have to completely avoid a game I'd potentially like to buy, play and enjoy.
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No, you don't. Before you go internet digging, you should have considered clicking "options". I know you're colourblind, but I for one am still surprised you missed this:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v59/KillerKebab/Forums/serious.jpg
 
Killerkebab said:
Ah my mistake, I thought you had actually bought the game and couldn't find it in options :p

Apologies, sir.
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Nah I haven't bought it yet but after looking at reviews and many screenshots + videos I never saw anything about changing the colours in any of that lot -.-
 
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