No Sound, No Problem: Accessibility in Gaming for Deaf and Hard of Hearing Players

Key insights

7 takeaways

01
Deaf and Hard of Hearing (DHH) players actively adapt to design gaps by using external tools, custom audio settings, and visual cue interpretation, proving they are active participants rather than passive recipients of accessibility features.
02
The lack of standardized visual translation for directional audio, environmental sounds, and off-screen events remains a primary barrier that creates significant competitive and immersive disadvantages for DHH players.
03
Multiplayer voice communication is a major site of systematic exclusion; players identify the lack of real-time speech-to-text captioning as a critical failure that prevents effective teamwork and social interaction.
04
DHH players advocate for granular audio mixing—such as the ability to amplify movement cues while reducing weapon fire or background noise—rather than relying on simple, one-size-fits-all volume adjustments.
05
Effective accessibility design should move beyond static text to dynamic subtitle systems that visually encode audio properties like direction, distance, and emotional tone to reduce cognitive load.
06
Advanced haptic feedback, such as converting audio cues into patterned vibrations via controllers or wearables, is a highly desired feature that allows players to perceive sound through tactile sensations.
07
While games like The Last of Us Part II are recognized for setting high standards in visual audio-to-text translation, the industry still lacks universal, consistent implementation of basic captioning across all titles.

Summary

No Sound, No Problem: Accessibility in Gaming for Deaf and CHUNYU LIU, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, USA MENGTING AI, University of Illinois Urbana Champaign, USA PHILO WANG, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, USA RACHEL F. ADLER, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, USA Video games play an increasingly important role in entertainment, social interaction, and cultural participation, yet accessibility challenges affect not only who can play games, but also how play is experie...