Colorblind issues for BioShock 2

Russ Frushtick, an MTV blogger, posted an article questioning the colorblind friendliness of this smash sequel.

“I'm color blind and I reviewed "BioShock 2." You'll note in the review that I didn't mention having issues with the hacking system, and that's because I didn't,” said Frushtick.  “There have been games over the years that, because of palate choices, were nearly impossible to play (the "Puzzle Fighter" series is probably the most glaring), but "BioShock 2," with its color-oriented hacking system, was no problem at all.”

He cites this article as proof that it is possible to see the difference in the colors, at least enough to complete that part of the game. In addition, that “tritanopia” would be nearly impossible to see any difference in the colors, but he doesn't mention that Deuteranopic, which is the main form of colorblind gaming and responsible for 5-7% of overall colorblind gamers, would also not be able to tell the difference.

“I'm not saying those gamers with tritanopia should be ignored, but sometimes in game development you sort of need to play triage with accessibility,” said Frushtisk.

Really?  I'm pretty disappointed to see a fellow disabled gamer post that sometimes you have to overlook accessibility.  This is exactly what AbleGamers is fighting for; very easy to adapt changes to a particular game that can be turned on or off in the options without hurting the rest of the game.

If the developers needed an example, they could have looked at how Blizzard handles colorblind issues or any of the other dozen developers that have realized pasting symbols or patterns over top of colors can mean the difference between a playable or unplayable video game for up to 7% of male gamers.

Popcap has also been exceptionally kind to the colorblind gamer, including colorblind options in almost every single one of their titles. Yet, taking the additional art-time still seems to be a hang-up for some development teams.

We are reaching out to 2K Games in hopes they can hot fix this issue in an upcoming patch.

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