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7 Critical Errors

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3 user interviews

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1 a11y plugin

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7 Critical Errors | 3 user interviews | 1 a11y plugin |

Problem

Gaming is the largest and most profitable sector of the entertainment industry, but 66% of gamers have an impairment that creates a barrier to gaming. While online games have the potential to provide mental exercise, social interactions, and stress relief for millions of disabled users, Steam currently lacks accessible content for all. 

While advocates often find the virtual world more accessible than the one outside, they say more needs to be done by tech companies looking to capture the estimated $2 billion market for gamers with disabilities.

- Gene Myers, a reporter covering disability at NorthJersey.com

How might we provide accommodations to the gaming platform to make the content more inclusive and accessible to all users? 

A title page for "effective accessibility" research presentation by Rebecca Coursey with a dark blue background and light blue digital graphics.

  • Participants believe that websites are becoming more compliant due to the recent laws regarding WCAG

    Their reasons for playing games ranges from mental challenge to social interactions to entertainment

    They use Apple devices mostly because of the built-in accessibility features like VoiceOver and Zoom

  • 75% of participants said they played online games everyday

    Participants spend anywhere from $150 - more than $500 a year on games.

  • “The main page alone had so many issues that I didn’t need to look further to gauge if accessibility is a priority for Steam…and boy is it a nightmare.”

Discovery

Mike, a 40-year-old math tutor, is legally blind and must use a screen reader to navigate the web. Mike loved to play games as a kid on the Nintendo and even had a Wii. Those games were accessible due to the larger graphics and keyboard control. Mike would like to download some classic games off of Steam, but is worried about the accessibility of the platform.

Using the Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool, I was able to identify the usability barriers on Steam.

63% of the critical errors came from missing alt text. The platform relies on images to convey information about the gaming content, and without the alt text, much of the content is inaccessible for users with low vision.

Accessibility Audit

Success Criterion 2.1.1 Keyboard

(Level A): All functionality of the content is operable through a keyboard interface without requiring specific timings for individual keystrokes.

Making critical navigation keyboard focusable benefits those who cannot use devices such as mice that require eye-hand coordination or who may have trouble finding or tracking a pointer indicator on the screen.

A screenshot of Steam's homepage with sticky note annotations about how to improve accessibility of content.

Success Criterion 1.1.1 Non-text Content (Level A): All non-text content that is presented to the user has a text alternative that serves the equivalent purpose.

Alt text tags need to be added to all screenshots of the games to help people who have difficulty perceiving visual content or people who have difficulty understanding the meaning of photographs.

Proposed Solution

I used an accordion component to make the plugin as unobtrusive as possible so as not to overwhelm the user with all of the different options. I created profiles for the most common types of disabilities using the WCAG as my guide and used toggle switches and checkboxes for complete customization of the features.

TAKEAWAYS

Limitations of tools

I struggled with the prototype I built on Figma and the limitations on how many interactions I could place on a single object. I realize the need for more specialized tools like Webflow or ProtoPie to create hyper-realistic prototypes which can aid in usability testing a product.

Accessibility is for everyone

In talking with users, I realized that many people without disabilities use accessibility features daily. Features like zoom and highlighting text which are more commonplace now, especially on touch screen devices are helpful to all types of users.

Finding the right participants

I also struggled initially to find “the right” participants to conduct user interviews with. I wanted to talk to people who actually used screen readers since that seemed to be the biggest problem on Steam’s website. Recruiting a specific group of people proved difficult and somewhat invasive, as I did not wish to offend them by asking them to name their disability outright.