By the Skin of His Teeth – The Quest

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The Skin of His Teeth!

Hello, Ability Powered gamers! Today on The Quest we are heading to Gilneas City in the worgen starting area to complete By the Skin of His Teeth. Lord Darius Crowley is asking for our help:

 

One of those mangy fleabags got Dempsey real good. We cannot move him until we stabilize his bleeding.

Give us a hand holding back these mongrels. A couple of minutes is all we need,

Hold back the worgen atop the Gilneas City Prison for 2 minutes.

 

What? A Timed Survival Quest?

Sounds chaotic! Quest accepted! Here are my tips for surviving:

  • During the quest, worgens attack from different directions. Put your back against the wall behind the Non Player Characters (NPCs) to make sure they are always in front of you. This let’s you target easier without moving to face enemies.
  • Don’t feel overwhelmed. You have a buff and are being healed. The NPCs around you also help you fight.
  • You can do this quest at the same time as others without being in a party. If you do it during a peak time odds are someone else will be doing it too! Doing it simultaneously doesn’t double the amount of mobs, so the more people the better.

 

And Quest Complete!

Short seen in her custom World of Warcraft wheelchair discussing By the Skin of His Teeth on The Quest today.Overall, this quest isn’t as chaotic as it may seem at first. It actually requires no movement, and you really don’t have to worry about making fast moves. This makes it great for us disabled World of Warcraft fans in need of additional accessibility! But don’t take my word for it, check out the worgen starting zone today and give us your tips for completing this quest! You can even find more of The Quest here!

 

 

 

10,000,000 – Accessibility First Look

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10,000,000 Accessibility Options

Hello, Ability Powered gamers! This week we are checking out a casual Steam game called 10,000,000. Think of it as Bejeweled or Chuzzle with a purpose. In 10,000,000 you are doing the basic Chuzzle gameplay of sliding blocks vertically or horizontally to match blocks of three or more. What makes 10,000,000 unique is you’re not just aimlessly matching blocks. You’re actually using matches to fight monsters, defend yourself, unlock doors/chests, and collect materials to upgrade your dungeon.

 

Screenshot from 10,000,000 showing that a keyboard will not help you.

 

10,000,000 Ways to Play

The game starts in windowed mode. A message pops up immediately letting you know there’s no use for your keyboard in this game. Options are scarce when you view the settings. Only volume sliders and options for vsync and fullscreen mode exist. There’s no colorblind mode, but each block is different colors and marked with icons. There’s also no voice acting, so no subtitles were needed.

 

10,000,000 Dungeons

Gameplay itself is a lot of dragging blocks into position as quickly as possible. Some precision is needed to align blocks, I didn’t have a lot of trouble. However, a few times I accidentally let go of the block too soon resulting in the wrong blocks being destroyed. Good news though, you do need to make matches quickly to survive. You can also upgrade your dungeon shops to make each dungeon run easier. Overall, dungeon runs are pretty short, so fatigue shouldn’t be an issue.

 

10,000,000 Hours of Fun

Short seen in her custom World of Warcraft wheelchair as she accesses 10,000,000 and its accessibility options.All and all, this game was really fun and unique. I thought I would get bored quickly with the repetitive dungeon grinding, but at 13 hours played I’m still having a blast. But don’t take my word for it, Check it on Steam.  Can you escape? Find our other First Looks and more here!

 

 

 

 

 

Unholy Heights – Accessibility First Look

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Unholy Heights Accessibility First Look

Hello, Ability Powered gamers! This week we are checking out Unholy Heights. Ability Powered is getting dark, first The Binding of Isaac and now we’re Satan managing apartments. You read that right. In Unholy Heights Satan (played by you) manages his apartment building and has his tenants fight against incoming invaders.

 

Game options for Unholy Heights seen including music volume, SFX volume, screen resolution, and more.

 

Unholy Accessibility Options

Options that are in-game are pretty scarce. The game starts in windowed mode and has borderless edges, there is an option for fullscreen mode. There are no subtitles or colorblind mode in the options. There’s also no voice acting going on, so subtitles are unneeded. Colorblind mode would help as some quests are color coded according to the tutorial.

 

Unholy Heights control commands seen for gameplay.

 

Unholy Heights Heightens

Gameplay is very point and click, and I really couldn’t make it playable with Windows‘ on-screen keyboard. With a standard keyboard it is playable using the hotkeys above! There’s no keyboard is necessary for mouse-only gamers. You can speed up gameplay during the slow periods, and have the game automatically slow back down when events occur. The game can be paused or saved at anytime, so fatigue shouldn’t be a concern.

 

Concluding Unholy Heights

Short seen in her custom World of Warcraft wheelchair as she accesses Unholy Heights and its accessibility options.If you can play point & click games and have always wanted to be Satan running an apartment, this game is for you. The tenants themselves are so adorable it’s worth checking out on its own.  But don’t take my word for it, check out Unholy Heights on Steam and let us know what YOU think! Check out our other First Looks and more here!

 

 

 

 

Wildstar Beta – Accessibility First Look

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Wildstar Beta Accessibility

Hello, Ability Powered gamers! There’s a new Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Play Game (MMORPG) coming soon called Wildstar, and we checked out its Beta this weekend. I didn’t get to test it as much as I hoped, but I did check out the options and a little questing for you guys. There are tons off options here to customize how you play.

 

Wildstar Beta Addons

There are already addons in-game for almost every aspect of play. Whether you enjoy tradeskills variety of gameplay or simple keybinding Wildstar has it. I didn’t test any out, but there were tons to choose from.

 

Wildstar Beta Combat

Combat options include Move to Target and Auto Face Player versus Environment (PvE) Targets which both should help reduce character movement while attacking. You can also turn on an option to make double clicked objectives able to be single clicked instead. Also, you can queue abilities and hold down an ability to repeatedly cast that specific one. Colorblind options are already in and you can specify between Deuteranopia, Protanopia, or Tritanopia.

 

Wildstar Beta Audio/Video

Under audio you can enable Cinematic Subtitles which are already in-game. There’s also slide bars for music, voices, effects, and more. Also, video settings include windowed mode is available as well as fullscreen with borderless edges or fullscreen exclusive modes.

 

Wildstar Beta Chat/Combat Logs

Chat log has options to set font size. While the combat log allows you to log various performance informational about you and those around you.

 

Wildstar Beta Heads Up Display (HUD)

Wildstar’s HUD has a ton of customizable options. You can set various parts of the User Interface (UI) to be always on, always off, on during combat, or off during combat. See what you want, when you want!

 

Wildstar Beta UI

This section has a lot of different options to help Ability Powered gamers. One big feature is Click to Move. Click to Move is backwards from World of Warcraft’s and moves your character when left clicked. There’s also a UI scale that let’s you customize how big or small the default UI is.

 

Wildstar Beta Keybindings

Wildstar’s detailed keybinding section let’s you change abilities, movement, targeting, and interface toggling. One main thing I noticed that seemed to be missing though is auto follow which as you imagine allows players to auto follow other players. This accessibility option is fantastic for us that sometimes get tired during gameplay.

 

Wildstar Beta Nameplates

You can chose what you see on other players’ nameplates, and if nameplates are always on or only when a player is targeted.

 

Wildstar Beta Options So Far

All and all, Wildstar does have a lot of customizable and accessible options. I honestly can’t tell if more is needed this early in the gameplay, but I can’t wait to see more out of this up and coming MMORPG. But don’t take my word for it, check it out and let us know what YOU think! Check out our other First Looks and more here!

 

 

 

 

The Binding of Isaac – Accessibility First Look

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Binding of Isaac and Accessibility

Hello, Ability Powered gamers! This accessibility first look we checked out The Binding of Isaac. This is an action game where you’re trying to fight your way through a basement to escape certain death… from your mother. Needless to say it’s a dark story!

 

Isaac’s Options

I knew upfront that movement was keyboard based, but I was very curious about if it was still playable with a mouse. The game starts in windowed mode and is borderless, so on-screen keyboard is usable! There’s no options for colorblind mode or subtitles. As a matter of fact there’s no subtitles on the opening cinematic which explains the whole story. Good luck knowing what’s going on for all those with seeing issues.

 

The Binding of Gameplay

As far as gameplay goes, as expected it is keyboard heavy! The movement of your character needs a keyboard or joypad. It IS playable with Windows‘ on-screen keyboard, but was quite frustrating since I had to choose between moving or shooting. I was able to take down a boss by staying back and shooting, but during room advancement success depended a lot on the type of bad guys in each room. If the baddies were ranged or patrolled, I could carefully maneuver well enough to win. Mobs that were melee, however, made escaping many times impossible. You can shoot with your mouse which does help if nothing is chasing you. Completing a level of the basement was a huge victory, but short lived since you begin back at level one upon death.

 

Binding of Conclusion

Short seen in her custom World of Warcraft wheelchair as she accesses The Binding of Isaac and its accessibility options.It IS playable via on-screen keyboard, keyboard only, or joypad. However, to me the frustration of not being able to move and shoot simultaneously via on-screen keyboard wasn’t worth devoting hours to. The lack of subtitles also was disappointing since the developer makes the opening cinematic the story of why you’re even running through your basement. But don’t take my word for it, check out The Binding of Isaac on Steam and let us know what YOU think! Check out our other First Looks and more here!