Messages

1

General Discussion / Re: Exploring Unreal World as a Totally Blind Player

« on: February 26, 2026, 05:43:12 AM »

Hi there,

Yes, broadly I think this is correct, but it's a bit more nuanced of course.

For an example, I'm using the SRAL library, which lets programs talk to screen readers directly but doesn't require a lot of customization. My reverse engineering work basically hooks into URW and can, for example, read the messages as they are written to the screen or tell what menu item is selected. I don't change the game code permanently, just hook in and announce things.

IT's not perfect, but does work surprisingly well.

A Braille display is an entirely different thing. There are some which have basically a "screen" of multiple braille lines, and they cost thousands of dollars; I've never seen one. By far the more common arrangement is a single line of 40 braille characters, more or less.

Anyway. I hope this is somewhat helpful Sorry for the delay in getting back to this! If you were using Espeak or Flite on Linux, they do sound horrible. Most screen reader users have strong opinions about voices.

2

General Discussion / Re: Exploring Unreal World as a Totally Blind Player

« on: February 20, 2026, 06:09:11 PM »

Hello Erkka,

I'm very happy to hear from you. I realize that adding screen reader  accessibility is a lot, but i'm happy to talk things over in whatever forum works for you. This is a public thread but I do spend a lot of time on Discord, so whichever you prefer.

As for communicating with  screen readers, the approach I take is using a library which lets me just make the screen reader say arbitrary text. IT's a lot less work than adding a full accessibility layer would be. We definitely can go beyond thet ext console these days

I'm happy to chat specifics about my approach or what would be helpful. Thanks for helping with this game, it's a delight.

3

General Discussion / Re: Exploring Unreal World as a Totally Blind Player

« on: February 20, 2026, 01:24:23 AM »

Well, I just discovered swimming.

This is one area I might suggest an alternative approach to the developers, as I drowned in a literal flood of messages

Navigating waterways is going to be tricky. I wasn't aware the game had pseudo-real-time bits, which makes accessibility trickier in general.

IT looks like I can use look mode to stop the flood at least, not to mention prevent messages from repeating at the script level. Still, it's at the least disorienting.

4

General Discussion / Re: Exploring Unreal World as a Totally Blind Player

« on: February 18, 2026, 06:18:15 AM »

I will definitely do that.

You're right that my principle difficulties are around getting data out of the game, though I have some hackish ways of doing so. The less fiddling I have to do the better. SO much of it is already plain text, all those stats and skills and item details. I'm glad it's as playable as it is

5

General Discussion / Re: Exploring Unreal World as a Totally Blind Player

« on: February 17, 2026, 10:16:23 PM »

Thanks so much for both of these

I was aware of the message log text file but didn't realize it stored the location where things happen. This will probably come in handy.

I'm excited to explore more. Right now I'm able to do the very basic "build a fire" sorts of things, but I always wander off and lose track of it.

I decided to go ahead and purchase the Steam version because I do want to support further development, and I really like what this game offers in general.

6

General Discussion / Exploring Unreal World as a Totally Blind Player

« on: February 16, 2026, 02:15:02 PM »

Hi All,

I'm a totally blind fan of Unreal World, who has recently begun investigating ways to play it with my screen reader. The game itself doesn't have accessibility support of its own, but I've discovered that I can use a mild sort of reverse engineering to add speech to certain aspects of the game, such as when new messages are drawn. My current workflow is mildly janky, and I am kind of dissatisfied with it, but it's far better than simply using OCR on the game screen.

That being said, I wonder if anyone has done work making alternate interfaces for the game, or digging into the data formats at all? I know this is kind of a technical topic for a general  board, but I thought I would try to post somewhere just in case. If I need to go elsewhere please feel free to move it

Right now the biggest issue I have is figuring out what surrounds me on the map. I've tried to use the look command frequently but often as not just get the admonition to pick a direction I can see, which is rather ironic in my particular situation

I am currently using the legacy free version on Windows, but fully intend to buy the Steam version as soon as funds permit. Essentially, if you can imagine trying to play the game without being able to reliably look at the map, that's about where I am at the moment. I can read menus more or less fine, and use keyboard commands, but the actual business of survival is tricky without being able to orienteer.

Any thoughts on this situation would be very much appreciated