Seeking feedback and suggestions for the Blindfold series of iOS games

By KidFriendlySoftware, 13 November, 2015

Forum
iOS and iPadOS Gaming

Tennis is on my list of games. Would people want the game to use arm movements like the Wii, or use your finger on the screen?

Also, are there any other games or suggestions that you have for the Blindfold series of iOS games?

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Comments

By chad on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

hi is it possible to have a feature to play opponents online instead against the computer

By Steve on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

I remember having occasional access to a hand-held talking baseball game in the early 90's. Unfortunately, I don't know who made it, but I loved to play it. That would be my vote.

By siria on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

Hi kidfriendly! Have you looked on www.audiogames.net? The comunity there can maybe give you lots of tips on how the more complex audiogames should work, and they have a great database from where you can view examples of what's been already done.

By KidFriendlySoftware on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

In reply to by siria

Yes, I contribute and follow that forum as well, and get a lot of suggestions from them

By jrjolley (not verified) on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

I like the sound of Bejewelled. It's a match 3 for those who don't know, bit like change reaction but with gems of different colours.

Also looking forward to the game with 2048 and threes, will be fun to see how I get on with that.

Her sentiments match mine. Also, on other games, I know you've said that you are looking into pinball. Exactly when to hit a flipper could be done through a series of beeps in which you tap at the highest. If you hit just ahead or after the highest tone, this could be a way to steer theball to another flipper that would send the ball where you actually wanted it to go, sort of like passing the ball from flipper to flipper or aiming for a particular bumper or switch on the table. Purchase add-ons could be different pinball tables.

By Jesse Anderson on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

Hello. Great work on the Blindfold series of games so far. I didn't realize there were so many out already until recently.

I would also like to see online play. Even the turn-based play for many titles would work. Leaderboards for high scores would also be cool.

I'm really glad to hear that a Threes game is coming soon. As a low vision gamer, I've been addicted to the real thing for about a year now, and would love to see an accessible version of this. Excellent!

I'd like to see other simple IOS games be adapted to an accessible version. Some of the simplest titles are the most addictive and work best on a touch screen. Some examples I play visually are:

Jetpack Joyride - I think this could be fairly easily adapted. Sounds could come in from the right, and based on pitch, you'd know how high you'd need to be in order to dodge or collect an item. the pitch of your jetpack on the left or center could indicate how high you were on the screen.

Tiny wings - Not quite sure how to accurately represent when to slide and when to let go, but it could work.

Fruit Ninja - A fun classic.

Giant Boulder of Death - This concept could also work as an audio game pretty easily, and it's just fun crushing stuff with a giant boulder.

ridiculous fishing - The dodging and collecting parts could be adapted to stereo audio, but I'm not sure how to adapt the shooting part.

Match 3 games - Games like Bejewled, Puzzle Quest, 10000000, and Dungeon Story. I like having games with RPG mechanics and items in addition to the puzzles themselves because it adds another layer of accomplishing something in the game.

Desert Golfing - Another addictive game. I'm not sure how to audibly represent this one.

I'd like to see some of these games made accessible because they are fun visually, and I think many could be adapted to an audio version fairly easily.

By Bingo Little on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

Just a thought: darts might be reasonably easy to design and I think that would be great. Again though, if you do it I would like to see it in realistic tournament mode, so set play or match play, 501, finish on a double etc. if this grabs you at all you could check out www.pdc.tv for the various tournament formats. I've already suggested rugby, cricket and golf in case those suggestions got lost in the rearrangement of this thread, but I have to admit I am not creative enough to know how this would be done.

By Piotr Machacz on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

I think a lot of the card games would make a really good transition to OS X. In my and many other people's opinion the Mac needs a lot more accessible games, and most people coding for computers only code for Windows. The result of this is that you have at least 4 or 5 completely different developers having made a solitaire game for example, though the same could be said for blackjack or poker, while there is absolutely nothing on OS X. The control scheme you have would actually work really well on a computer if you replace the left/right swipe with pressing the arrow keys and enter. I think there is a market for this and I'd be happy to test if you decide to do this.

By Ornella on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

Hi. I have a few games that I would like to suggest. Pool, monopoly scrabble and slot machine.

By sockhopsinger on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

Baseball would be my favorite choice. There is one baseball game that is accessible out there, but it is so unrealistic that it is laughable. You swing the bat when you hear the pitch, and you then here the sound of the ball off the bat. Funny thing is even if you swing, it sometimes calls a ball. And there is no rhyme or reason to whether or not you get a hit. Anyway, that's my opinion on the subject.

By Jared on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

While I enjoy the games I will not spend $14.99 for unlimited play per game. I also find watching videos anoying to get coins so I tend to play a game until my coins run out then never play again. I'd gladly pay $4.99 for unlimited play per game but based on the simplicity of each game I can not personally justify $14.99.

By KidFriendlySoftware on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

In reply to by charles

That's on my list ,and from building skee ball (called vee ball), I already started laying it out. As to the flippers, I will probably have you swipe up or down, and give you a warning set of beeps. I also started on designing a game called Build Your Own Game, where you could layout both winning goals and obstacles for balls. Do you think it would be popular?

By KidFriendlySoftware on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

In reply to by Piotr Machacz

Right now, all my coding is for iOS. Transitioning to mac is do-able, but non-trivial. Transitioning to any other platform, like android or PC is a major effort, and in both cases, its makes many more people happy to have more games, than move my existing games to another computer. Plus, the phone has a gyro and other things that make the game more realistic.

Unfortunately, even at these game prices, it does not pay for itself. I understand your frustration. Apple keeps 30%, and building a game takes weeks and weeks of time. Maybe as more and more people hear about the games, and I get more purchasing them, I will be able to lower the prices.

By Wayne Scott Jr on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

Me personally, I'd prefer finger. But, I think you shuld give people the option of eiter arm or finger.

I would like to see an accessible baseball game. Also, an accessible Monopoly.

By Joe on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

I think I commented before but golf would be amazing. I would also love baseball or as someone just said I would like to see an accessible baseball game. Also, an accessible Monopoly would be great.

By mehgcap on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

Hello,
First, I love many of your titles, and appreciate you seeking feedback from us, the community. My suggestions are for most or all of your games.

Mostly, I'd like the voices used to be 'normal'. That is, instead of having to adjust each voice to be a normal pitch, why not use that pitch by default? The extremely high pitch is one thing whose purpose I've never quite understood. I'd also like to have a global voice adjustment, to quickly set the speed and pitch of all the voices used. Finally, I'd really love to see VoiceOver used for speech output, mostly so that braille users can play. I know braille won't work for audio games, but card games should be fine.

In general, I'd love to see the existing titles enhanced, where it makes sense to do so, instead of having new ones while current ones get left behind. Small things, like the special bricks one person mentioned, or allowing a summary of cards (card x through card y) to be spoken in Solitaire.

I really do appreciate all the options the Blindfold series has given us, and I don't begrudge the developers their payment system at all. This stuff has to make money, and this community is very small. In fact, to never have to pay again, $15 seems reasonable; Dice World, which is a game for sighted people, charges far more for gold with no truly unlimited option at all. Keep up the great work, Marty!

By KidFriendlySoftware on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

In reply to by mehgcap

When IOS 9 came out, all the voices got messed up. I think the default settings for the voice - where neither pitch or speed is modified, gives a relatively normal sound, but I find the voice speed is too slow. While I am adding the ability to use the voice over voice, especially for people with braille readers, there is less programmatic control of that, and you cannot stop the voice mid-sentence, which makes the game go much slower. Most of the games stop talking when you tap the screen.

I didn't catch the posting about the special bricks; if you can point me to that one, I can look into it. I'm not sure exactly what you are looking for in solitaire as to a summary of cards. Think about it, and describe it in detail, and let me know if would apply to all solitaire games, or just one or two variants. A lot of the gestures within solitaire are already used up.

By mehgcap on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

First, I forgot to say that Breakout, at least, doesn't pause during a phone call. I heard the game continuing even as my phone was ringing.

Solitaire: I mean, instead of hearing only one card in a stack, I'd like to hear the high and low cards. If a stack contains the king of hearts, queen of spades, and jack of diamonds, I don't just want to hear "jack of diamonds". I want to hear both, as in "king of hearts through jack of diamonds". That way, I know not only what could go on this stack, but what this stack could go onto. I don't know the variants--I play only one or three card basic games.

The thing about the bricks suggested that sighted versions of Breakout include special bricks; hit them, and you might get rewarded with an extra ball or the brick could take out some around it. Perhaps you could set it up so that the user has to hit two bricks in sequence, since every brick will be hit anyway? Or, possibly a bonus if you hit x bricks before the ball returns to the paddle?

By Vsevolod Popov on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

Hi. I would like to see leaderboard for challenge mode in blindfold racer, leaderboard with scores in blindfold hopper and simon. When will be update of blindfold racing released? Thanx.

I will update that in a few months. while that is our flagship app - read the blog - we haven't touched it for years.
In the meantime, I will be doing other games.

By kingdekka on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

Yo Brandon. I can agree with your points to an extent, and before you come at me with the whole You've never touched a game console in your life thing. I'm a totally blind and going pro at killer instinct for xbox 1. I can see where you're a bit upset. but things take time bro. I would like to see gamecenter in these games too. I hardly play games on my phone. I'm to busy playing gta, and other games with my sihted friends. I can agree with KE7zum as well. Some people don't like the aspect of a multiplayer game. As a gamer we have to respect other people in the gaming community. I can see where the hatred for gaming consoles can stem from them having a sight only aspect. I started on the 2600 and made my way up. being blind all your life the learning curve is a steep one. This guy is learning the ways of audio gaming I'm sure when Kid friendly software jumped into this, he wasn't expecting much of it. But look where he is now. All I'm saying, is, we should give it time, and I'm sure he'll be the guy making some of the biggest games in the vi community.

By rdfreak on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

Just wanted to say how great these games are.
I rarely play games on the iPhone these days except for these ones. They're of an extremely high quality and your dedication to the blind community is amazing and I for one, am very grateful.
Actually I have noticed that the games have gotten better and better with each new release.
Well done. :)

I can thank the testers - about 10 dedicated people who never cut me a break, and tell me if something sucks. And they come up with great ideas. And, the fact that the programming infrastructure that I am creating makes each game that much easier. It took about 2 months to restructure all the games so they share a common infrastructure, so now when I add one feature, all the games can get it.

And, given the small market he's dealing with, you expect money to be made at your price suggestion? Someone's got to pay the light bill, and that someone should be the gamer. I feel that if you're not willing to spend a very reasonable roughly $15 for a good game, you can put up with watching very short videos.

By charles on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

In reply to by KidFriendlySoftware

The idea is intriguing. This might conceivably be a way to create a billiard or snooker table, or to make our own pinball tables. Another option, although it would be a lot of work for you, I would think, would be if a way to send our creations to you for evaluation and reworking to improve them, and they you could distribute them. That would probably be down the road, though.

By Unregistered User (not verified) on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

Hello, thanks for all of the great games, especially Solitaire which I play regularly. One thing that I would like to see in these games is native support on the iPad. As it is now, you have to download the games as iPhone apps and they run in a small screen window on the iPad. While they were possible to play on the iPad in this way, it is not convenient and there are often times when certain gestures don't work and other problems occur. I know that not all of these games would be practical for the iPad, such as the ones we have to swing your arms, but I would really like to see native iPad support for the ones that make sense to have it like solitaire, spades, and other card games and such. Thanks, and keep up the great work. I love your games and am happy to pay for them as I feel they are of high quality and very entertaining.

By KidFriendlySoftware on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

In reply to by charles

One of my long term goals with these games is to develop a way to reach the tens of thousands of blind people throughout the USA and the world, as well as the low vision people. Once I know how to reach all of these people, it would be far more likely that other developers will build products, since they will finally have a way to tell the blindness community about them. Then we would probably find many sighted programmers volunteering to work with blind people to further develop the ideas like you mentioned.

By KidFriendlySoftware on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

In reply to by Unregistered User (not verified)

I agree with your comment about swinging the ipad, but unless you are a low vision user, I would think the card games would not suffer. If you (or others) have low vision, I would like to hear from you as to which game to improve first, and what's important in those games. I am completely naive as to the needs of low vision users, and need to understand why typical games that are accessible don't offer the enjoyment that you require.

By Syd on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

Firstly, I'm loving the new air hockey game! Used to play this a lot as a child but often lost to sighted people... It's been fun to play again! Being a huge football fan and terribly jealous of all the people who can play Fifa I would love a football game... Not sure how it would work, but I'd love it if it were possible. That is, English football, not American football just to be clear!
Look forward to a tennis game, I too agree that the option to either swipe with your finger or play with arm movements would be good, would be much harder to play at work without anyone noticing if it had to be arm movements!

Also I'd love to ask the person who commented a few comments back how you play GTA with no sight!

By kool_turk on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

A couple of years ago someone made a type of Tetras game using musical notes.

I never bought the game myself, found it too pricy for such a simple game.

Anyway if anyone here remembers the game called Metras, they might be able to explain it.

I agree , Kid Friendly Software reminds me of Jim Kitchen's games, only for iOS.

Going further back, there use to be a space invaders game on an old note taker called the Eureka A4.

While that particular game wasn't called space invaders, it was called Aliens.

Back then, games didn't have stereo, so the the developer of Aliens used musical notes to represent the ships.

What you had to do was match the notes by moving left and right and hit space to fire.

There was a space invaders game a couple of years ago on iOS called audio invaders, but the latest version never worked for me.

The game simply wouldn't launch.

That one had stereo, but the buttons were small so was hard to find.

The developer use to post on here, but he seems to have vanished.

You should be able to find audio invaders listed on this site, asuming it hasn't been pulled.

It was quite hard the first time. Then I started asking my sister where everything was. I sort of tok that into memory, and now I know how to get around the city to a sall extent. If you have anymore questions, you can kik me at duke.togo, or contact me on cord. I don't know how to do personal messages on the site.

By siria on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

Nebula also is an accessible space invaders, however, from what I've played, you have just a few ships on the screen each time, and although they fire at you wich is a good thing, they all move in a very similar way. It would be cool to have 4 or 5 different kinds of ships, with different movements and different weapons. For example, there could be a ship that, instead of using bullets, divides into 2 smaller and very fast descending ships when you fire at it. Not sure how hard it would be to program though, I'm not a programmer.

By charles on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

In reply to by siria

The subject line is probably the best game of the Space Invaders type of game, playable on the PC. Five waves of ships, each wave is an increase in difficulty. 8 levels of differently behaving ships.

Getting back to games we'd like to suggest, there was a game in which you had 3 or 4 sticks that you had to move left or right. Eachstick had men attached to it. When the man is lined up with a ball, you spun the stick to make the man kick the ball toward a goal. To block the progrss of the ball, you had to move a defender in front of the ball rolling toward your goal. I think, but am not sure, that the gameis Fooz Ball or something like that. I'm not sure how this game could be played on an iPhone, but it was a fast action game for sghted people that might be cool.

By Eric Davis on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

I would like to see an option for a price that sets the play to unlimited play for all games. I know that this may be asking something that is not doable, but I would buy it. Perhaps you could do it for the holiday season. Just to see how it goes.
Thanks for the hard work. You have done a great job with a challenging device.

By mehgcap on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

A few more things for Breakout, which I think I'm really understanding now. I've managed to complete three games of Simple Breakout, at least.

  • An option to have "unlimited" bricks in whatever game you choose, instead of capping it at ten.
  • A pause option, to let you examine the remaining board while a ball is still in play.
  • I got a low battery warning last night, but the game kept playing even as I tried to dismiss the alert. It should pause for this and, as I mentioned previously, for phone calls.
  • When a ball is lost and a new one is put in play, the game should speak how many balls are left, not the current ball number. I need to know if I have 1, 2, or 10 balls remaining; telling me that this is the fifth ball I've played so far means nothing. Unless I'm missing something?

Thanks!

all good ideas. The next time I jump back into that game, I will add those.
The unlimited brick option is a bit harder. The bricks are created in a physics engine, and they exist on the screen as objects that the ball can hit. There's not really room for more than 10 bricks and still have a space for the ball to bounce against the top wall.

By Missy Hoppe on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

Hi there! I don't know if this would ever be possible or not, but figured it couldn't hurt to make the request. Someday, might it be possible to make a single app that gives access to all games? The old Jim Kitchen games, DiceWorld and even the RS games server have a single menu through which all games can be accessed. I guess I figure that since all of the voices and things are the same with the Blindfold Games, perhaps some sort of single app could be developed someday; am kind-a picturing an app where you open it and the list of games is shown. Then, you can pick the game you want and play as normal. I'm just thinking this would be nice for folks who might want fewer icons on their homescreens and don't have the ability or desire to put apps into folders. If it's not do-able, I completely understand, but it's the only feature request I can think of.

Unfortunately, that's really hard. Each of the apps have their own unique coding, and it would take months to combine everything. I understand the home screen limitation, but you cannot imagine how much work this would be.

By Michal Badin on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

hi, what about an 15 puzzle type game? with various board sizes? i mean the one, where you move numbered tiles on the board, and try to have the the empty spot on the right bottom corner.

By gallagher123123 on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

First, I just want to say thanks for making all of these excellent games. My favorites so far are Blindfold bowling, and blindfold Wildcard. I would love to see some dice games, especially, Blindfold Farkle. The interface of your games is just so easy and fun to play with. Keep up the great work.

I'm starting to get more requests for that. I know what you mean. I want to do that app, but I want several game choices. What else besides the 15 game, on a 4 by 4. Would you want 5 by 5, 6 by 6, and so on. Are there any other similar style games to this?

By KidFriendlySoftware on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

In reply to by gallagher123123

I think dice world already has that, and from what I've heard, its very accessible. What's your opinion?

By Toonhead on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

Yep, Dice World already has Farkle pretty much covered. I have another idea that would help folks to get unlimited games, and get more games at the same time. have you ever considered doing app bundles? For example, you could do a bundle of card games like hearts, crazy eights, and wild card for something like, gosh I dunno, maybe $$7.99, and that could include unlimited access, if that's possible to do. I do think the idea of having a system that gives everyone unlimited access for a small fee for all games would be great. I do know this stuff takes time, but at your current output, I'd say you're moving along pretty well. I just installed blind fold V ball.

The name of the app is puzzle. Totally Voice-Over friendly, you play on either a 4 by 4 grid or a 5 by 5 grid. It is a free app. Do a search for puzzle in the app store and you'll know the right one by looking at the description.

By charles on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

In reply to by gallagher123123

Dice World contains 6 dice games, and is both Voice-Over friendly and free. The games include Farkle, Yahtzee, threes, 1-4-24, Pig, and Balot. Check out the podcasts in the podcast section of this site, and get it from the app store.

By Jim Homme on Sunday, November 22, 2015 - 23:25

I'd like to see more realistic spares, we get a lot of 710 splits, and the computer always gets seven 10 splits but the user doesn't.