Raven Software, the custodian of Call of Duty: Warzone, has added a bunch of new accessibility features in the latest Season 4 Reloaded patch.
The studio has made several efforts over the last few patches to make Warzone accessible to more players. In the latest update, Raven is focusing on three areas: those who are hard of hearing, blind/low-vision, and who experience cognitive overload.
What’s new?
Players can now adjust how long chat messages stay on the screen when received. Previously, messages sent via the in game chat system would appear on screen for three seconds before disappearing. Now, players can choose to disable text chat entirely, or have messages stay on screen for either 15, 30, or 60 seconds.
Raven Software says: ‘By adding more customizability to the amount of time the text chat stays on-screen when new messages are received, we hope players will be better supported in strategically communicating with their squad without needing to rely on external hardware, such as headphones.’
If desired, players can also change how long system messages appear on screen independently from player messages. There’s also now an option to keep the text chat widget on screen at all times. It’s intended to be especially useful to those who experience cognitive overload or who have low visibility.
In addition, Raven has added a message sound alert option. Enabling this setting will play a short audio cue whenever a message is received. Players can choose to either hear the cue for player messages, system messages, or both.
‘By using audio to provide a second channel of visual information communication, we hope that this option better supports Player-to-Player communication for blind and low-vision Players,’ says Raven. ‘Adding an audio cue helps alleviate the need for visual acuity at the periphery of the screen, where the text chat element lives’
It’s great to see more developers taking accessibility features seriously. The developers of Psychonauts 2, Double Fine, also recently announced that its upcoming sequel will have several accessibility features. In a statement, the studio said that ‘all people should be able to enjoy games’.
Will you find these accessibility features useful? Let us know across our social channels.
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Featured Image Credit: Activision