Blind and Visually Impaired Community
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Developer working on a blind-friendly accessible mobile chess game. Feedback needed! (self.Blind)
submitted by alias176
Hi all,
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I'm currently working on some accessible mobile apps as part of a university here in the US. One aspect of this involves creating an accessible mobile chess game. I've chosen to take on chess with the mindset that it could be made accessible by implementing naming that can be read by VoiceOver. A chessboard is lettered A through H from left to right and 1 through 8 from top to bottom. If you selected the black rook in the upper left-hand corner, then VoiceOver would read "Black rook - A1" or something like that. You could also tap on any other square and it would read what's on it. I'd be happy to clarify further if that's confusing.
​
So I've been discussing this with my team and we're trying to account for some of the potential obstacles that might come up and a few main concerns have been voiced. Specifically, there's some concern about the feasibility of being able to keep track of the board without a visual or tactile element. I am visually impaired, so I know that spatial mapping for blind/low vision folks is generally very good. That being said, I don't want to make assumptions about completely nonsighted folks or people who wouldn't be using their eyes at all to play a game like this.
​
Put simply, I would love to chat with someone who might have some input about how this could be made effectively for our target audience. Is it totally nonfeasible? Could it work well? Any feedback is much appreciated!
​
I'm currently working on some accessible mobile apps as part of a university here in the US. One aspect of this involves creating an accessible mobile chess game. I've chosen to take on chess with the mindset that it could be made accessible by implementing naming that can be read by VoiceOver. A chessboard is lettered A through H from left to right and 1 through 8 from top to bottom. If you selected the black rook in the upper left-hand corner, then VoiceOver would read "Black rook - A1" or something like that. You could also tap on any other square and it would read what's on it. I'd be happy to clarify further if that's confusing.
​
So I've been discussing this with my team and we're trying to account for some of the potential obstacles that might come up and a few main concerns have been voiced. Specifically, there's some concern about the feasibility of being able to keep track of the board without a visual or tactile element. I am visually impaired, so I know that spatial mapping for blind/low vision folks is generally very good. That being said, I don't want to make assumptions about completely nonsighted folks or people who wouldn't be using their eyes at all to play a game like this.
​
Put simply, I would love to chat with someone who might have some input about how this could be made effectively for our target audience. Is it totally nonfeasible? Could it work well? Any feedback is much appreciated!
pitermach 3 points 3y ago
Personally, I'm not a fan of the blindfold games approach, as the developer completely reinvents the wheel in terms of the user interface. Instead of exposing the grid to VoiceOver so you could explore the board with your finger, they opt to control the game with a handful of 1 and two finger swipes to move a virtual cursor and read entire rows and columns at a time which I personally found more frustrating than helpful as it throws standard VoiceOver navigation concepts out the window.
I have never learned to play chess, though I'd like to do so at some point. That being said, I know that VoiceOver friendly chess games exist. A quick Google finds that chess wise was made accessible, so this may be a good point of reference how to expose the board to VoiceOver. The touch screen makes spacially understanding the board easier because you can either swipe through it or just "feel" the board by touching around the screen, so I feel like exposing the interface to VoiceOver would probably be the far more helpful and probably easier way rather than abstracting the interface Blindfold Games style.
I have never learned to play chess, though I'd like to do so at some point. That being said, I know that VoiceOver friendly chess games exist. A quick Google finds that chess wise was made accessible, so this may be a good point of reference how to expose the board to VoiceOver. The touch screen makes spacially understanding the board easier because you can either swipe through it or just "feel" the board by touching around the screen, so I feel like exposing the interface to VoiceOver would probably be the far more helpful and probably easier way rather than abstracting the interface Blindfold Games style.
BlindOwl12 1 points 3y ago
If you made the chessboard a grid, it would be relatively easy to navigate using the vertical navigation function of voice-over, That would be my preferred way, it could just tell you what was on the square with white porn black night etc
Superfreq2 1 points 3y ago
CloudsOfMagellan 1 points 3y ago
Shreder does this quite well, there was an online one I had a while ago too that worked
For longer games I'll normally set my board up to mirror the game
For longer games I'll normally set my board up to mirror the game
ErtaySh 1 points 3y ago
Aw wish this was a backgammon app instead. It is strange that there isn't an accessible version with online capabilities so far.
alias176 [OP] 2 points 3y ago
That could definitely be an option in the future! I'll share it with the team. Do you have any thoughts about the chess model?
ErtaySh 1 points 3y ago
I was about to edit my previous comment. You should check out Chess Wise, another chess app that has VoiceOver support and look if you can improve upon their solution.
Chess-wise 3 by Marcel Nijman https://apps.apple.com/mk/app/chess-wise-3/id788594027
Chess-wise 3 by Marcel Nijman https://apps.apple.com/mk/app/chess-wise-3/id788594027
AllHarlowsEve 1 points 3y ago
I don't really imagine that this would be all that difficult. I know that there's a blindfold Checkers app, and I play Mah Jongg on my phone accessibly.
It seems like it should be pretty simple to have a command to read where pieces are, maybe a 3 finger double tap, and you can choose from a list if you want all pieces, your pieces, opponent pieces, your certain pieces, all pieces of a certain type, etc.
It seems like it should be pretty simple to have a command to read where pieces are, maybe a 3 finger double tap, and you can choose from a list if you want all pieces, your pieces, opponent pieces, your certain pieces, all pieces of a certain type, etc.
ErtaySh 1 points 3y ago
Can you share the mahjong app?
AllHarlowsEve 2 points 3y ago
Sure, no problem.
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/blindfold-pyramid-tiles/id1235887256
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/blindfold-pyramid-tiles/id1235887256
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