Here's how streamer Rudeism played Dark Souls 3 with a single button in the name of accessibility - article
"Git gud," is the slang that players use. After all, Dark Souls games are all about difficulty. They are designed to make you struggle and falter, even swearing in extreme cases. But some struggle harder than others.
And that's why streamer Rudeism decided to play Dark Souls 3 entirely in Morse code using a single button. Not just to prove it's possible, but also to prove that everyone can play video games differently, even Dark Souls.
"It's not just a matter of getting good but rather it's: it doesn't matter how good some players are, as they can't react fast enough to this fast-paced, reaction time-based game designed to being operated with a controller. And it's based on your being an able-bodied person, "Rudeism explains.
Watch on YouTube. For him, the difficulty is a set of accessibility options and should be included to allow a wider audience to access the games. The difficulty is subjective after all.
"Dark Souls is easy for some people, difficult for others and impossible for others," says Rudeism. "What is objective are the obstacles that arise in front of you ... the problem then becomes the ability of the players to overcome those obstacles. And if these players have some form of disability, then it is physiological that everything becomes more difficult. for them.
"That's why difficulty options are necessary and why they make games more accessible: they can reduce the difficulty of overcoming these obstacles for disabled players, not for the pure purpose of making the game more accessible. everything easier. It is about offering an adapted and scaled challenge based on the functional abilities of each individual. "
Dark Souls 3's one-button run of Rudeism was streamed to his Twitch channel and did not represent his first time of Morse code being used as an input. He had previously played Super Mario 64 with a similar control scheme, having come up with the idea of playing a one-button game.
"I designed the controller, which to be honest wasn't the thing. hardest in the world. It's just one button in a box, "he explains.
Dark Souls 3 has been beaten with Morse code! ?
19 bosses, 258,250 button presses. (DLC to come)
And just because it can be beaten with one button doesn't mean games like Dark Souls shouldn't have accessibility & difficulty options! ?? pic.twitter.com/DporRqC15E
- Rudeism (@rudeism) October 24, 2021 This content is hosted on an external platform, which will only display it if you accept targeting cookies. Please enable cookies to view. Manage cookie settings After trying Doom Eternal, which proved impossible due to the lack of an aiming lock system, Dark Souls 3 was the natural next step as a "traditionally difficult game". First of all, Rudeism had to decide which move should match which input on the single button: short press, long press, or a whole sequence of pushes.
"The way I thought was to make sure that the inputs I use most frequently were assigned to short sequences, so attack and roll are the two most used moves during a fight, "he explains. "So I assigned them to single button presses."
Then there are character movements, camera lock, item usage, and weapon switching, with small but complex actions set with inputs of four sequences. Learning these sequences was also difficult, even if he had already used and memorized some of them in Mario's run, for which he had helped himself with a paper schematic containing the sequences. It can be said that during a 60 hour run the controls are memorized along the way and in the end they feel natural.
"We are so used to the standard controllers that now we don't even think about looking for the A or B button, we know how to I remember their location. And in the end you create the same memory with the Morse code controller. You do it without thinking about it, "he explains. "It's just a different system." All this in the name of accessibility, to show that even alternative control schemes can work with a little ingenuity and time to learn.
But it was the fight with the boss Twin Princes, the penultimate of the game, that brought accessibility to light, due to the high speed of his attacks. The Morse code controller has 250ms latency to launch input sequences, but that time frame can be fatal in a Dark Souls game. "I was dying and continuing to die in the first phase because I just wasn't fast enough to react to the boss's moves," explains Rudeism.
This has somewhat reproduced the experience of a disabled person trying to play Dark Souls. "There has to be that kind of delay introduced into the game, in order to allow time for a disabled person to react to the actions they see on the screen. So when you factor in this delay in typing inputs and you have situations like that of the boss Twin Princes, the game becomes really impossible. And I think having a difficulty option that slows down the action times of the bosses and enemies can be really useful. "
Rudeism admits that the difficulty is a decisive component of the identity of Dark Souls, but the possibility of adapting the experience to the player's ability certainly does not diminish the value of that same experience. And he cites Hades and Celeste as striking examples. "There are games like Hades and Celeste where you have accessibility options, which can make the game a breeze for someone who doesn't need those kinds of options," he explains. "But those games are still respected for their difficulty, they have stories that are based on something that sometimes seems impossible.
" I think there's a lot of that in Dark Souls too. But those games aren't spoiled by having accessibility options, it just happens that more people play them. In the end we play those games because we like it, and I don't think there's anything wrong with sharing that fun with others. "
Rudeism's interest in accessibility ranges from inventing controllers with a wacky design, like playing Untitled Goose Game with a duck costume equipped with motion control, to playing Rocket League with a controller. Guitar Hero. "When I started this project I realized how accessible some games were and how many were not at all," he tells us.
Voice-activated honking. Motion-controlled flaps . Moving by waddling your feeties.?
THIS is how Untitled Goose Game is meant to be played.
? Sound on!? Https : //t.co/zYmwx36Hkq pic.twitter.com/DJLigMw64J
- Rudeism (@rudeism) October 2, 2019 This content is hosted on an external platform, which will only display it if you accept targeting cookies Please enable cookies to view Manage cookie settings Recently this phenomenon has led to the creation of downright bizarre controllers to promote Far Cry 6 , a game in which improvised weapons are forged from raw materials. Rudeism has created controllers for other streamers, including a waffle maker, a power saw, and a rice boiler. And more.
"The fun thing, at least for me, is trying bizarre ways to subvert inaccessibility. I enjoy doing experiments that work. But I have the luxury of being able to choose, because if I want I can simply take a standard controller and play normally ".
What started out as a fun way to mod games has grown into a passion for new control schemes, not just for promotional purposes but to emphasize accessibility. Take for example the recent Forza Horizon 5 which doesn't allow you to map mouse controls to drive. With a little work, Rudeism did it.
So @ForzaHorizon does great job with accessibility, but I noticed something missing - you can't map driving controls to the mouse.
I broke out the Arduino and rigged my own mouse up as a proof of concept on how it could be done - what do you think? pic.twitter.com/FXLNeuod9k
- Rudeism (@rudeism) November 16, 2021 This content is hosted on an external platform, which will only display it if you accept targeting cookies. Please enable cookies to view. Manage cookie settings He admits he's privileged in this area and points out how satisfying conversations about accessibility can be, particularly with friend Stephen Spohn senior director of the charity AbleGamers.
"I think has changed a lot on the internet, empathy has come a long way ", he explains. "If you think of these systems in perspective, empathizing with the people who can truly benefit from these kinds of things, I think it doesn't take long to realize just how brilliant this idea is."
With a little bit of understanding, everyone should have a chance to praise the sun.
