God of War Ragnarök will have more than 60 accessibility features
God of War Ragnarok will include more than 60 accessibility features when it releases on PlayStation 4 and 5 later this year.
The list of features was revealed in a PlayStation Blog post, which said developer Sony Santa Monica has combined the options available in the original God of War (2018) with those in the PC version, while also adding some brand new ones.
Newly added features include full controller customization, where players can choose from several preset layouts or map their controller themselves to a layout that works best for them.
Complex actions also come with a preset list of alternate options, and for actions that require more than one button, multiple shortcut keys can be assigned instead, including touchpad swiping.
For traversing in Ragnarok, players can enable features like auto sprinting, which require fewer key inputs overall, and other actions like gap jumping, vaulting, etc. can also be automated.
A navaid button has also been added, which toggles the player’s view of the next story objective, and audio cues can be used to indicate interactive objects during exploration and even in combat, for example for weapon switching cues.
Sony Santa Monica has also “invested heavily in improving its subtitle and caption system.” Increased minimum text size and added new scaling, including extra large text size.
The text itself is also customizable, with players able to mix and match seven different colors between speaker names, the subtitle text, and individual audio captions (which can also be customized with multiple options available to represent different sounds).
Directional markers can also be added for sounds important to the story, such as B. Kratos hearing a sound to his left for players to explore that tells players which direction the sound came from.
The background behind the subtitles can also be adjusted, with players being able to blur the background or darken it with multiple opacity settings available.
The size of in-game symbols, such as B. Key prompts, indicators of a locked chest, etc., can also be resized.
Another visual option is a high-contrast mode that allows players to highlight enemies, items, traversal color, etc. in different colors to see things more clearly.
A persistent point option has also been added, providing an additional focus for reducing motion sickness, alongside options to toggle various actions with a single button press (e.g. holding your shield up) instead of holding the button down.
God of War Ragnarok is still slated for a 2022 release date, despite several rumors suggesting otherwise, with developers reassuring fans in April that the game would be out this year.
PlayStation exclusives have been somewhat at odds with adding a variety of accessibility options at launch, with games like The Last of Us Part 2 setting a high standard (allowing players to set accessibility options before anything else), but the more recent release of Deathloop has been has been missing accessibility options for months (although the latest patch has added extensive options).
Microsoft has made accessibility a focus for its developers, introducing guidelines for its developers and even a rating system that ensures games are made for all players.
The initiatives appear to be working, as the Xbox Series X includes a number of accessibility-focused options, and Forza Horizon 5, exclusive to the Xbox console, won last year’s IGN award for notable advances in accessibility.
Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelancer who occasionally thinks about tweeting @thelastdinsdale. He’ll be talking about The Witcher all day.
https://www.ign.com/articles/god-of-war-ragnark-accessibility-features God of War Ragnarök will have more than 60 accessibility features
