Editor’s Note: Shay was born a gamer without sight. She started playing games at a young age. They ranged from Pokemon to Mario to games played only with sound. Shay is also a streamer on Twitch. When not gaming, she likes to read, talk to friends, and sing.
From sea shanties to shooting cannons, Sea of Thieves is truly a hit-or-miss game for gamer without sight accessibility. It’s best played with a group of people who are good at communicating. What we can do is limited, and there are still some things that could be improved on, but overall I enjoyed my experience.
When starting the game for the first time, I had assistance with my character selection. From there, I was able to adjust my settings with the help of the Narrator (the text-to-speech software on Xbox). The accessibility settings ranged from aim-assist, to button toggles, to options for color blindness. Some of this I did not need, but did happily take the text-to-speech options and a few others I thought would aid me during gameplay.
When I first set sail, I didn’t know what I was in for besides knowledge that I had picked up from another gamer without sight – essentially that you can steer the ship, fish, and shoot cannons. This was exciting to hear and I couldn’t wait to try it out for myself. So what did I do? Look for people to play with and learn with, of course. I had made mention somewhere that I had the game and was interested in playing and that’s when it all started.
When going to the ship at the start of the game, I was able to make it out of the tavern on my own, but after that I needed to be guided and told where to go to board, where to go to vote on the proposed quest, and finally, to the helm.
Steering was more accessible than I thought it would be. When turning left or right, you can feel slight vibrations or haptics in the controller for notches, which is great for being told how far to turn. You also hear a sound which sticks out that will let you know when you’re centered. With this knowledge, and the instruction of my crew member, I was successfully able to take us from our start location to our island destination.
When arriving at our destination, I once again had to be guided from the ship to where we needed to go. Luckily, this only required digging up some chests and destroying the spawning skeletons. With more guidance I was able to dig up the treasure and get it back on board. All in all, a successful quest.
On our way back to the outpost, I got to try out the cannons. They make clicking sounds, so to use them we can be told how many clicks to move in any direction. Once we made it to port, I was able to sell the items we picked up from our voyage at the proper locations with even more guidance. We also gave fishing a try. I am not a pro by any means, but I know this can be done with practice. I will learn to master such tasks some day.
As a gamer without sight, I do think that a few things could be adjusted in the game to make our adventures a more accessible and less guide-dependent experience. The current version I’m writing this post about has Narrator support for a few menus, but is missing out on a couple. Specifically, we can’t see how much gold we have, the menus to propose quests at the table, or buying and taking quests from the merchants when available.
I’d love to see some kind of ping system implemented in the future. This ping system could be a way-finder to help us get to our ship, find chests, and more. Other pings could be inserted to help find tables, and the helm to steer.
Another great help would be if the Narrator were able to tell us what islands and other locations are as we draw near them, since the map is currently not accessible for us. There is subtle music that I’ve picked up on for outposts, but that’s about it. Aim-assist is helpful, but it’d be great to see a lock-on option to help when shooting at skeletons and other players. As this is a PvP game, having an announcement of nearby ships would be valuable. I enjoy the haptics and think they could be useful for the cannons. An idea could be either a slow vibration indicating that we are far from the object and faster when our aim is closer to the target.
I am really glad to have tried this game and will continue to play it. I will try to update this review as possible based on my preference of playing. My suggestion is that If you can find a group, give Sea of Thieves a shot it if you have GamePass. I’d recommend two to three other players to join you on your adventures if you are a gamer without sight.
