Arcess Game Lab

Arcess.com is developing a wide range of arcade, logic, educational and card games. Our ultimate goal is for each game to be universally accessible - designed to be enjoyed by players with a very wide range of ages, languages and abilities.

To achieve this it will be necessary for the games to be extremely flexible ( quickly and easily adjust, size, contrast, speed and difficulty, through a very wide range) and the games will also need to support a wide range of input / output devices and support many languages.

Flexibility without complexity is not an easy task but the aim is for the games to be as fast and easy to setup for a player with a severe disability (eg. single switch or blind player - or both) as it would be for a player without a disability.

This games lab is designed to receive feedback on the ongoing development of the games. Each game will be under continuing development. It is unlikely that any of the games will ever be 'finished' in the traditional sense. Stable versions will be released for sale but development won't stop there. As we learn more about how to increase the flexibility of the games, we will release updated versions that will be available online.

The first games in the lab are a new version of our Brickout game (an early demo is available here now) and a switch accessible card game called 21.

Brickout, has 30 editable levels that you can play on almost any Internet connected Windows, Mac or Linux computer. Login and play with your own personal settings. Three themes are available with extensive support for low vision and alternative access methods (switches, expanded keyboards etc.). We are offering an initial opening special subscription price of just US$19.

Accessible
Games will be playable by most of the alternative access devices as long as they emulate the keyboard or mouse. There will be strong support for low vision (large characters and high contrast) and in the 2nd phase of the project, later in 2008, we plan to add full support for sound feedback to enable blind player to play.

Play online anywhere
These new 'Flash' based games can be played online using Internet Explorer, Firefox or Safari web browser on almost any Internet connected computer. When members login, the games will automatically adjust their personal settings.

Public / Private password
Members will have two passwords. The 'private' password is designed for use on the member's own computer and gives full access to their personal game setup. The 'public' password is for use on other computers where the member's password may not be secure. Using the public password, members can play the games online with their own personal settings but cannot permanently change settings (and neither can anyone else using a public password).

Our Original Games
Our old games, now over ten years old, are still available as a free download but will eventually be replaced by new versions with many new features.