Sony has released a new PlayStation 5 controller called the Access Controller, which is designed to be customizable for disabled gamers. It allows users to configure different buttons, triggers and sticks to suit their individual needs. The kit aims to help people who struggle with thumbsticks, pressing buttons, or holding a controller. Feedback from disabled gamers was incorporated into the design. While a step forward, some find issues like the lack of a right stick limits gameplay in certain genres. Overall though, the product and others like Microsoft’s Adaptive Controller are helping make gaming more inclusive for disabled players.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The Access Controller is a “highly customisable kit” of different buttons, triggers and sticks that lets players create a set-up that suits their needs.
“The idea is that you unbox it and you can start using it right away as a PlayStation controller,” Alvin Daniel, Senior Technical Program Manager at Sony Interactive Entertainment, told the BBC.
But designing accessibility products is a massive task, as every disabled person’s impairment is unique to them, and gaming technology is always evolving.
Even the packaging is accessible, and the setup process, while clunky at times, lets people adapt the controller to their own specific requirements, and even create different profiles for different games or situations.
There are however one or two design decisions that are, at best, bewildering - for example, it doesn’t feature a right stick that is standard on all modern controllers and fairly essential to many genres of game.
“I think particularly if you’re a young person today, gaming is such a big part of popular culture, that you are socially isolated or you’re left behind if you can’t participate in the same experiences your friends or your schoolmates are doing”, he said.
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