I discovered over the weekend while playing Portal on a friend’s orange box that it has closed captions AND subtitles, and the handheld controller vibrates during certain events, such as firing the gun or impacting.
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video games
Via Kotaku:
Kotaku reader A_Zombie contacted us about an email to industry trade association Entertainment Software Association (ESA). He contacted them regarding the lack of subtitles in gaming. Not sure if ESA is the place to go with this concern as the ESA is the industry’s “voice.” Regardless, here’s the letter:
Dear Sir or Ma’aam,I am a deaf 20 year old that loves to play videogames. I’ve been playing videogames ever since I first played the Atari 2600 with my father as a young child. Back then, games were not as complex as they are today. Sometimes, as a deaf gamer, I struggle with many mission based games such as Quake 4, Star Wars: Rouge Squadron Rouge Leader, Perfect Dark 0, Need for Speed: Carbon, X2: Wolverine’s Revenge and many others. The reason for the frustration is for the lack of subtitles in the above mentioned titles. Quake 4 is a perfect example of my frustrations of what I am supposed to do next because the mission objectives and ways to beat certain bosses were given over the intercom and it was mostly garbled. Perfect Dark 0 was frustrating for me because I had no idea what was going on with the story. At one point I was fighting in buildings shooting at mobsters and all of a sudden I’m fighting a midget skinless Chinese dude with a sword in some alternate dimension. That did not make sense for me at all because… who was that Chinese dude?
He’s got a point. If you know the right person to give this letter to, please do. Thanks!
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