Audio game
Based on the popularity of Touch Me, in 1978 Milton Bradley Company released a handheld audio game entitled Simon at Studio 54 in New York City.
Beginning in 1996, Milton Bradley and a number of other producers released the handheld Bop It which featured a similar concept of a growing series of commands designed to test eidetic memory.
Being text-based meant that they were relatively accessible to visually impaired users, requiring only the additional use of text-to-speech (TTS) software.
For the same reason, following the development of TTS software, text-based games such as early text-only works of interactive fiction were also equally accessible to users with or without a visual impairment.
[6] Since the availability of such software was not commonly accessible until the inclusion of the MacInTalk program on Apple Computers in 1984, the library of games which became accessible to the vision impaired spanned everything from the earliest text adventure, Colossal Cave Adventure (1976), to the comparatively advanced works of interactive fiction which had developed in the subsequent 8 years.
[6] Accessibility for the visually impaired began to change, some time prior to the advent of graphical operating systems as computers became powerful enough to support more video-centric games.
To effect this, a sound is played in the left, center, or right channel to indicate an object's position in a virtual gaming environment.
Generally, this involves stereo panning of various sound effects, many of which are looped to serve as indicators of hazards or objects with which the user can interact.
Volume also plays a major role in 3D audio games primarily to indicate an object's proximity with reference to the user.
These parameters have allowed for the creation of, among other genres, side scrollers, 3D action adventures, shooters, and arcade style games.
Warp was founded by musician Kenji Eno and consisted of a five-man team including first-time designer Fumito Ueda.
[12] Nintendo, as part of its shift to alternative gameplay forms, has shown recent interest in audio games through its own development teams.
[13] In July 2006, Nintendo released a collection of audio games called Soundvoyager as the newest member of its spare Digiluxe series.
A guide provides the instructions to users verbally, and they use their breath to explore a forest filled with relaxing environmental noises.
[23] The rise of text-to-speech (TTS) software and steady improvements in the field have allowed full audio-conversion of traditionally video-based games.
While this was originally only available for strictly text-based games like text adventures and MUDs, advances in TTS software have led to increased functionality with a diverse array of software types beyond text-only media allowing other works of interactive fiction as well as various simulator games to be enjoyed in a strictly audio environment.
[28] Other features that make the game completely playable without sight include the use of voice actors, haptic feedback, and audio cues that act as hints to the player.
