As I continue to refine and finalize my Hexteria game, I keep reading things that say it’s important to consider color-blind players. Roughly one man in twelve is color-blind, and one in two hundred women. Many game design guides recommend using more than just color to differentiate pieces; shapes are useful. I’m pleased that Hexteria has cool pieces which have not only unique colors, but unique (and thematic) shapes.
However, each player has a set of pieces they use as they deploy their forces in the game, and those pieces come in four colors: red, green, blue, and yellow. It’s worth noting that many (most?) board games with three or four players have pieces in these same colors. It’s sort of an unofficial “standard” across the genre. However, since color-blind people overwhelmingly have red-green blindness, it means they can’t easily distinguish those two players in a game!
Here’s an example of the meeples I’m using, in the traditional colors:
And here’s what they look like to someone who’s red-green color-blind:
Oops. How can they know which pieces belong to the red and green players?
So, knowing all this and thinking about how to make Hexteria more “accessible”, I’m planning to change the colors of the players’ pieces. Behold the purple, orange, white, and black version:
A color-blind person would see them like this:
Ah, much better! Plus, they won’t conflict with the other pieces on the board, which also happen to be red, green, blue, and yellow. Double win.
As I continue on this journey of game development, I’m learning a ton of stuff. This might seem like an insignificant thing, but I’m hoping that at some point, a color-blind player sits down to play Hexteria and thinks, “This is great!” instead of “Oh no, another game where I can’t tell which pieces are mine…”