FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
REDMOND, August 7th, 2023 – This year’s USA edition of the Game Accessibility Conference, GAConf, has been announced for October 9th-10th , a hybrid event between Zoom/Discord and an in-person gathering Archer Hotel, Redmond. Tickets are now on sale.
GAConf is a two day conference co-hosted by the IGDA’s game accessibility SIG and CNAM, dedicated to making games more accessible to gamers with disabilities. The event features talks and networking for all disciplines of the games industry, exploring recent and future advances in game accessibility.
Attendees can expect a wide range of topics from all sectors of the industry - indie to AAA, academia to accessibility specialists - and leave with inspiration, new contacts, and practical tips to ensure any game can reach as many people as possible, so no player is unnecessarily excluded from everything that games have to offer.
The first wave of speakers has been announced, including Tara Voelker of Xbox, Jessica Roache of Ubisoft, Améliane F. Chiasson of Player Research, Jenna “Jennissary” of Descriptive Video Works, and independent specialists & advocates such as Ross Minor, Alexx Aplin and Ian Hamilton. Many more still to come!
"It was incredibly powerful hearing the journey and experiences with game accessibility from both the creators and the users"
- Warfighter Engaged
“So happy to have first hand accounts from players about their gaming experiences”
- Nikki Crenshaw, Senior UX researcher, Blizzard
“Fantastic day at GAConf celebrating and getting tons of hot game accessibility tips!”
- Jenny Lay-Flurrie, chief accessibility officer, Microsoft
“Literally the most informative conference I’ve been to in a very long time!”
– David Tisserand, Director of Accessibility, Ubisoft
Awareness of the importance of game accessibility has increased hugely in recent years, with ever growing numbers of developers seeing the benefits. Attendees will take home practical knowledge of how to ensure their vision can reach as wide a range of players as possible, allowing more of those players to benefit from the access to culture, recreation and socialising that gaming brings.
Tickets are now available from www.gaconf.com.
About IGDA-GASIG:
The IGDA Game Accessibility SIG is a special interest group of the International Game Developers Association. The IGDA-GASIG volunteers have worked since 2003 to aid the game industry in making games accessible to all players, regardless of impairments or other limitations. For more information, visit http://www.igda-gasig.org.
Press contacts:
Tara Voelker / Ian Hamilton
gameaccessibilityconf@gmail.com
Press passes are available on request.
Social:
Twitter - https://twitter.com/GA_Conf