Color Blind MODs

Nacht · April 2014

Well, since it seems that no game developers give a damn about the large number of color blind users there are out there who would love to play the game but cannot because of their handicap - it's up to you, the Modders, to help them out.

My roommate has total color blindness - he cannot see red against colors of similar saturation and contrast, which makes the very subtle silhouette around foes in ESO utterly invisible to him. So, what he asks is for a simple mod...

One that will allow him to define the colors that the game uses to highlight things like chests (or other interactables), and hostiles. A color wheel/palette would be splendid, but just having a small palette to choose from would be a huge help.

Can such color swapping even be done?

And... has anyone heard of any sort of legal movement in the USA to force developers to include such functionality under the ADA? If a football stadium has to... why not a software developer?

psychaostic · April 2014

I am not color blind so I am not sure the difference it makes but my video card has color blindness settings on it, and its not the first card I have seen them on. Have your friend check if his does, maybe that will help.

Bravely_Default · April 2014

A mod like this would be great. The subtle outline would be annoying, but more importantly, the ground gets marked with the same shade of red for incoming AOE attacks. That is a much more crucial gameplay element especially if you are going to do dungeons and raids.

Novau · April 2014

I dont even know as to why you can't alter the colours of text/auras to custom colours in the first place.

Aiiane · April 2014

Unfortunately, that glow is done by the world rendering engine, not the UI engine - as such, addons can't touch it. It'll have to be ZOS that adds such options.

Sakiri · April 2014

You can get a mod that changed creature name based on reaction, but Im unsure if THAT color can be customized.

Blizzard btw has a colorblind mode for WoW, so not everyone ignores it. Theyve also changed spell effects' colors before for visibility concerns.

ChanceofRust · April 2014

Dang, I never even thought about that. Sorry your roommate is struggling so much. My brother has cerebral palsy, and even though he is well off compared to a lot of people, he can't play heaps of games because his reflexes aren't fast enough if they require quick responses. Obviously it's hard for developers to ensure everyone can play properly, but it is a bit disappointing when they don't take it into account. Hopefully now that the issue is raised, ZOS will work on some alternate options. Even if as a quick fix they had a text option that labels things as enemies/friendly/lootable. That should be doable in a mod, shouldn't it?

Best of luck

Turkeysammich · April 2014

Just found this, I agree. I'm a tad colorblind, and the red cast radius that shows you when to dodge roll or block is hardly visible to me, I really need to be able to change the color, or make it more solid.

Cairenn · April 2014

Not precisely what you are looking for, but this could be a start &/or temporary solution:

Simple Combat Alerts

Habodek · April 2014

I would agree very much with the NEED for a color blind option.
It wasn't until I hit level 10 that I first noticed the red aura around enemies when some of their abilities triggered. LEVEL 10! I only noticed due to the color of the terrain I was on. (bright sand, I think) On most terrain, it might as well not even be there.

The dark red color for danger/awareness auras is a horrible choice. I have literally quit games before due to not being able to see the HUD and progression/quest indicators. Games that I REALLY wanted to play. To this day I'll never touch another Grand Theft Auto again due to Rockstar burning me on San Andreas. I got a PS2 just for that game too, but I'll never be able to play it. I couldn't even get half an hour into GTA:SA before I was permanently stuck on the first mission. HUD indicators were red, on red backgrounds, set against a red-tinted sky. Oh they were all different shades of red sure. But to me, I couldn't SEE the directional arrow in the sky or the glowing 'stand-here' circles on the ground. Absolutely invisible to me.

Wykkyd · April 2014

Unfortunately @Aiiane‌ is quite correct.

Addons used to cover this gap much easier before the api nerf but we've beaten that horse.

Turkeysammich · April 2014

legal action is possible, I haven't heard anything official, and it wouldn't take much for the U.S. to crack down. They forced color blind support in Battlefield 4.

Nacht · April 2014

Turkeysammich wrote: »

legal action is possible, I haven't heard anything official, and it wouldn't take much for the U.S. to crack down. They forced color blind support in Battlefield 4.

Probably because games like that are actively used by the REAL military for training purposes, so they're mandated to support all of the soldiers who are being thus trained - to include the color blind ones.

IMO color blindness is a legitimate handicap (just move the red light from the top to the bottom of a traffic signal and watch the chaos ensue) just like missing limbs or hearing. The ADA should force content providers (be it a software company, the post office, hospitals, schools, and even the highway system) to support all manner of sight from full color (which is what I enjoy) to little more than a black & white melange (my roommate).

I've flat out told him that he should not buy ESO, period. He was looking over my shoulder and couldn't tell the difference between a non-hostile NPC (yellow aura) and a threat (red aura). To him there was no aura at all.

Habodek · April 2014

Nacht wrote: »

I've flat out told him that he should not buy ESO, period. He was looking over my shoulder and couldn't tell the difference between a non-hostile NPC (yellow aura) and a threat (red aura). To him there was no aura at all.

There's a YELLOW aura too?
News to me.

I thought it was either white or orange for the friend-or-foe auras.

Rammerjammer · April 2014

I'm in this boat. I have terrible issues with red in particular, especially dependent upon the background. I can not see aura's around hostiles, AoE markers on the ground, etc etc. I've played the Wildstar Beta, and they have 3 different colorblind modes. I really hope ESO implements something similar.

McOden · April 2014

I too am color-blind and I enjoy tanking in most MMO's but in ESO I find it very hard to do so, since I can't see the red very well at all. So anything that will help this I am all for.

martinb16_ESO80 · April 2014

I have red/green colour blindness, and I did not know that there was a clue regarding a red aura until now ! The red areas are generally invisible to me, especially on green or grey surfaces. Bleakrock was fine because of the snow, but when I tried the wood elf starting area.... oh dear. In some other games it was possible to exchange the red indicators (for targeting/aoe/foes) for another colour such as blue which helps.

What most other people don't get is that red does not stand out for us, but white or yellow or blue does.

Either a colour-blind mode or the ability to change the indicator colour would be great.

Cydone · April 2014

This can't be done guys, it would ruin ppl's immersion.

Nacht · April 2014

Cydone wrote: »

This can't be done guys, it would ruin ppl's immersion.

How would enabling a method of playing the game for Sam ruin the immersion for Joe, who simply doesn't turn it on?

If anything, the current limitations ruin the immersion for Sam, who should be able to play the game just as easily as Joe but can't because of his handicap.

Not that it matters, I've just unsubbed. This game is just not engaging and too limited in scope for the Elderscrolls setting.

Cydone · April 2014

Nacht wrote: »

Cydone wrote: »

This can't be done guys, it would ruin ppl's immersion.

How would enabling a method of playing the game for Sam ruin the immersion for Joe, who simply doesn't turn it on?

If anything, the current limitations ruin the immersion for Sam, who should be able to play the game just as easily as Joe but can't because of his handicap.

Not that it matters, I've just unsubbed. This game is just not engaging and too limited in scope for the Elderscrolls setting.

I realize that my sarcasm didn't translate well, but it was just that. Sarcasm. People want to up play their "immersion" as something to bring down almost every good idea. Then if they have opposition to their line of thought, they immediately look to say "This breaks my immersion" or "Go back to WoW" or "We don't want another WoW clone". Which most ideas, such as this one, wouldn't be doing so.....not by a long shot.

Chaosx · April 2014

No thanks to the developers of this game, thankfully an addon has been created for people with color blind disability. You can download it here

http://www.esoui.com/downloads/fileinfo.php?id=280#info

Way to go Zenimax.....

leapermessiah · July 2016

I updated Thurisaz Color Blind addon that puts stars next to items to let u know the quality of the item so that its up to date with Dark Brotherhood. Hope this is ok to post here. I do not take credit for this addon and I tried to get in contact with the original creator with no luck. It has been abandoned for almost 3 years. It has helped me out tremendously due to the fact that i had a hard time telling the difference between green/gold items and purple/blue items. It puts 1 to 4 starts next to the items depending on the items quality.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0Bxnybfg2EkabSlhIbU44Ml9Eb2s