Accessibility and color blindness

Roughly 8 percent of men and about 0.5 percent of women have some form of color vision deficiency, most commonly trouble distinguishing red from green. At a four-player table, odds are decent that someone is affected. A game that distinguishes factions, resources, or player pieces by color alone is a game that some of your players simply cannot read, and they usually will not tell you, they will just quietly enjoy the game less.

The fix is redundant coding: never let color be the only channel carrying a piece of information. Pair every color with a second signal, a shape, a symbol, a pattern, or a label. Red cubes become red cubes with a flame icon, the green faction gets a distinct border pattern as well as its color. Done from the start, redundancy costs almost nothing. Retrofitted after art is finished, it is expensive, which is why accessibility belongs in the graphic design brief, not the errata.

Also choose palettes that hold up. The classic trap pairs are red and green, blue and purple, and colors that collapse together in dim light or at a distance. Free simulation tools, such as color blindness filters built into design software and sites like Coblis, let you preview your components under different types of color vision deficiency in seconds. Better still, recruit color blind playtesters, they will find problems no simulator flags.

Accessibility goes beyond color. Readable minimum type sizes, strong contrast between text and background, and icons that remain distinct at small sizes help players with low vision, older players, and honestly everyone playing in a dim living room. Games that are easy to read are easy to teach, accessibility and good graphic design are the same discipline.