It began with an e-mail.
Eelke Folmer, an assistant professor of computer science and engineering at the University of Nevada, Reno, had created a Web site that offered solutions to people who ran into problems when they tried to play computer games.
"Then, one day, someone said, 'Hey, I'm a quadriplegic, and the things you are doing could help people with disabilities,'" Folmer said.
Not long after that, he joined the International Game Developers Association and became a member of its Game Accessibility special interest group.
While some people might dismiss the project as merely providing the disabled with a frivolous pastime, it's much more than that, said Michelle Hinn, head of the Game Accessibility group.
"Computer games can be a way of relieving stress, but for the disabled, it's also provides social interaction," said Hinn, an instructor of game design at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.
Based on U.S Census Bureau statistics, about 10 percent of the population is disabled, she said.
Hinn said she gets numerous calls from doctors of patients, parents of children and families of Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans who are newly disabled.
"Computer games were something they really loved to do, but now they can't because they're missing a limb or they're quadriplegics or they've gone blind," Hinn said. "So, telling them there are games out there for them has worked almost like a miracle, but those games are rare and the availability is limited."
With the help of a $90,448 grant from the National Science Foundation, Folmer and graduate students David Carr and Bei Yuan are working to open the door to computer games for the disabled.
Their research focuses on developing a prototype that will allow blind players to use voice commands alone to navigate through the popular online 3-D virtual world "Second Life" and eventually interact with the other "residents" there.
"We just need to develop the right text output, and that is not a very easy problem to solve," Folmer said.
The world in "Second Life" is designed solely by its own residents, people from around the world who now number more than nine million, including the 30-year-old Folmer.
He has his own character -- or avatar as they're known in the game world -- that can talk with other residents, buy property, build a business or a home and visit places such as Paris to climb the Eiffel Tower.
Blind gamers will be able to press a button and a computer voice will provide information about their immediate surroundings, Folmer said.
"It would tell them, 'There are two avatars in front of you and a building to the north,'" he said. "You would classify what's around them based on its size and proximity to sketch (a mental) image for them."
A growing number of universities with virtual campuses online also have virtual auditoriums where people can attend lectures, so Folmer's research could have educational applications for the disabled. Under federal law, anyone with a disability must have access to such educational opportunities, he said.
While Folmer's research primarily targets the blind, he hopes it will convince major manufacturers to develop computer games that also can be used by players who are hearing impaired or have cognitive or physical disabilities.
It could be as easy as, for the hearing impaired, including closed captioning in every game, Folmer said.
"The game industry is very money-driven," said Folmer, who moved from the Netherlands to Edmonton, Alberta in Canada before joining the UNR faculty last year.
"When you try to sell your research, you really need to convince game developers they should make their games accessible to the disabled," he said. "And that's what we're trying to do first with 'Second Life.'"
Folmer and Hinn will be making the same pitch next week when they attend the Entertainment for All Expo in the Los Angles Convention Center.
The E for All Expo will be Thursday through Oct. 21 and attracts consumers, software developers, venture capitalists and entertainment industry representatives, including the big three: Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo, Hinn said.
Her Gaming Accessibility group has been given a free booth at the Expo.
"My job is the mouthpiece, the evangelist yelling for recognition of the needs of gamers with disabilities," she said. "I can lobby the president of a company, but without people like Eelke, we don't have anything to show them. He is the programmer. He creates the solutions."
Help for gamers
You can visit University of Nevada, Reno associate professor Eelke Folmer's Web site that describes problems novice gamers, the elderly and the disabled face when trying to play online games and offers solutions at www.helpyouplay.com
Game Accessibility
Visit the Game Accessibility special interest group's Web site at
www.igda.org/accessibilityE-mail Michelle Hinn, head of the Game Accessibility special interest group, at
hinn@uiuc.eduDownload free prototype game
Click here for AudiOdyssey, an experimental computer game designed to be accessible to the visually impaired and mainstream gamers. According to the Singapore-MIT Gambit Web site, "the user stars as Vinyl Scorcher, an up-and-coming DJ, on his quest to get club patrons dancing. Swinging the Nintendo Wii controller to the beat, Vinyl lays down the various component tracks of a song, and keeps the party jumping. If he does an especially good job, he can even freestyle! But beware: if dancers get too rowdy, they're likely to bump into the turntables, messing up Vinyl's tracks. Think you have what it takes?"
The Windows version of the game requires:
Windows 2000 Service Pack 4, Windows XP Service Pack 2 or Windows Vista
1.8 GHz Pentium-class processor or better
1GB of RAM
32MB video RAM For Wiimote play:
1 Nintendo Wiimote (Sensor Bar not used)
Bluetooth
