Diablo 4 is taking accessibility seriously, Blizzard says

pcgamesn.com:

A massive and substantially diverse community of players is awaiting the June 6 launch of Blizzard’s newest addition, Diablo 4, to its iconic action RPG game series. With such a large fanbase, it would be a significant oversight if the triple-A company chose to not place focus on the game’s accessibility settings. Thankfully, Diablo 4 accessibility seems to be at the forefrunt of Blizzard’s mind.

Outlining its plans, Blizzard details the accessibility features Diablo 4 will offer players, saying that “the only limitation to adventuring in Sanctuary should be interest, not capablity.” Lead accessibility designer Drew McCrory wants to strike the perfect balance between useful features for players with disabilities and enjoyable gameplay for others.

The team is focusing on settings such as dexterity assitance, text assistance, and vision assistance to achieve that very balance. Diablo 4’s dexterity features will include button remapping for both controller and keyboard, choice to swap left and right sticks, persistent target lock, as well as skill toggle and action wheel activation.

For players needing text assistance, there will be cinematic subtitles with optional features such as background opacity, font color, and size scaling. Fans will also be able to use their microphone for speech-to-text capabilities in order to make chatting easier.

Players with impaired vision will be able to change the size of both their cursor and the in-game font. They can also activate a variety of in-game audio gear cues, for example when mousing over different items. Both players and items can be highlighted with various colors, and screen reader support will be present, also.

It is always refreshing to see bigger game developers putting