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Accessibilityand inclusivity are both becoming increasingly important for welcoming more players to the community, especially amongindie games.
The rising environmental cost of the video games industry is finally being combatted by innovation and awareness.
Xbox has been a loud voice when it comes to better accessibility in gaming.
GDC 2024 was a fantastic resource for developers looking to improve their games' accessibility.
MacLean’s summit reflected a lot of my own thoughts on accessibility in games.
I love to see it, and I’m already seeing titles likeBotany Manorpush accessibility for indie games.
Xbox has been a loud voice when it comes to better accessibility in gaming.
GDC 2024 focused on the latter because finding and supporting diverse developers leads to naturally diverse stories and games.
There, developers can gather resources and knowledge to help them build better gamesandbring those games to more players.
More diverse talent leads to more creative and diverse games, and that’s good foreveryone.
Forza Motorsport (2023) is one of the most accessible video games ever made, but even smaller games like COCOON are still accessible purely because of their game design.
NVIDIA’s Audio2Face tech was used for the English facial animations in this game.
Of course, player representation matters, too.
It’s accessibility and inclusivity, but it’s also localization.
Xbox’s Global Expansion team is about finding more developers making more games in more places.
That being said, a lot of this is specifically for independent developers.
Localization is just as important as accessibility and inclusivity, and deserves as much investment as possible.
The earth is important to me.
Xbox is also vocal about sustainability, with Microsoft being one of the largest companies in the world (and therefore a sizeable contributor to climate change).
After all, I live here (and so do you, I assume).
Stone built the server herself, and it’s powered by aRaspberry Pi.
Even Xbox consoles have changed over the years to be more sustainable.
Baldur’s Gate 3 has proven that there’s a better way to run a studio, and CEO Swen Vincke has taken every opportunity to say as much.
TheXbox Series X|S are carbon aware and have several options to improve power efficiency, for one.
Xbox even has an entirepage dedicated to its sustainability investments.
Sadly, none of this will miraculously reverse the damage done to the environment.
No, not the sustainability I just covered, but sustainability for the industry itself.
In one way, it was literally aboutvoice.
The most prevalent issue afflicting the industry in 2024 is the amount of layoffs we’ve been seeing.
Riot Games cut 530 staff, or 11% of its workforce.
They’re just at risk of pissing off the shareholders…
The function of a public company is to create growth for its shareholders…
It’s not to make a happy climate for the employees."
Laying off your employees in endless talent-churning loops isnot sustainable.
Pushing crunch and driving burnout to meet aggressive deadlines isnot sustainable.
Creating profit-first instead of people-first games isnot sustainable.
Ignoring your developers in favor of short-sighted management and shareholder decisions isnot sustainable.
You want to make money?
Slow down and invest carefully in your employees, and stop running studios like they’re fast food joints.
The video games industry is no exception.
The more specific your answer, the more complications you’ll discover.
I’m hoping that, moving forward, these are the themes of video games in 2024.
Here’s hoping that every step forward from here is better than the last.
