- Indiana Jones and the Great Circle releases on December 9.
- The title from MachineGames has been well received by reviewers.
- Bethesda has put together a blog to detail the game's accessibility.
In the lead-up to the release of Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, publisher Bethesda and the team at MachineGames have shared details on the game's accessibility and approachability features.
If the reviews for Indiana Jones and the Great Circle are to be believed, everybody loves bashing some fascists with loaves of bread, shovels, and anything else they can get their hands on. For those of us with disabilities, taking on the iconic role of the whip-toting archeologist may seem difficult. Thankfully, the teams at Bethesda and MachineGames recognize that when we all punch Nazis, we all win.
In a post on the Bethesda Softworks blog, the team stated, "Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is designed to be an approachable and accessible game so that as many people as possible can experience the adventure as Indiana Jones."
Indiana Jones and accessibility menus
The blog post also shared details on what accessibility features players can expect to see in Indiana Jones and the Great Circle when it releases on December 9. The game's accessibility menu will feature a selection of quick options to find subsets of commonly used accessibility settings. This is similar to the menu navigation function found in Call of Duty's UI, which makes it easier to find accessibility options that often relate to one another together for streamlined adjustment.
Regarding the UI and Camera, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle players can expect to find adjustments for UI Font Size, Color Presets, and the UI Safe Zone. Players can also find camera adjustments for Field of View, Motion Blur, Camera Stabilization, and Screen Shake. Adjusting these settings can help players who experience discomfort from the fishbowl effect or motion sickness.
Color filters can be applied to make color cues in the game more visible, and those filters can be adjusted for brightness, contrast, intensity, and strength independently. A high contrast mode has also been added to highlight objects and characters. This can also be manually configured with adjustable strength and colors.
Subtitles are also included in accessibility settings, as well as closed captioning. Font size, visibility of the speaker's name, and subtitle backgrounds are adjustable.
For player input, the standards, standard accessibility features like adjustable vibration settings, thumb stick and trigger dead zones, and mouse and controller input sensitivity are all customizable. Players can set whether to toggle or hold the following actions:
- Toggle Sprint
- Toggle Aim Firearm
- Toggle Aim Photo camera
- Toggle Raise Lighter
- Toggle Prime Throw
- Toggle Boat Forward/Reverse
- Toggle Whip Free Climb
Indiana Jones and future accessibility updates
Bethesda and MachineGames' effort to include accessibility features in Indiana Jones and the Great Circle has led to some frustration in the accessibility community among players who face barriers because of low or no vision. The accessibility guide for Indiana Jones and the Great Circle does state that a screen reader will not be supported for menu or UI narration. The team has committed to working to implement a screen reader in a future update, but the absence of the feature at launch has led some in the accessibility community to voice frustration at the need for sighted assistance.
It's great to hear that a screen reader/menu and UI narration update is being worked on for this. Though I haven't had a chance to play it yet, I do fear that without accessible navigation of some kind, progress will still be very tricky without assistance. https://t.co/2GciBoEVCEDecember 6, 2024
There has also been debate over whether certain features listed in the accessibility guide can be deemed "accessibility" related. Bethesda has listed features like pausing during cutscenes and gameplay, replayable chapters, and multiple save slots as accessibility features, while some have shrugged these off as just expected elements to find in a new AAA title. These gameplay features are more geared toward making Indiana Jones and The Great Circle more approachable.
Gameplay accessibility is often an intersectional challenge, and there can even be conflicting access needs where improvements made for one community can override and create a barrier for another. Approachability and accessibility, like in the case of pause menus and in-game journals, can really be seen as another intersection in the path to developing games that are viable for as many players as possible.
Bethesda has created a support form for players to provide feedback on Indiana Jones and the Great Circle's accessibility features, though it does require signing up and logging in to the website to fill out the form. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle launches on Xbox consoles and PC on December 9, and is available on day one to subscribers of select Xbox Game Pass plans. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle has already received its first major patch ahead of its wide-scale release. You can read Windows Central's review of Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, where our own Samuel Tolbert says of the game: "Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is an absolute blast worthy of the iconic adventurer's name."
