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Xbox X|SWe've documented 24 accessibility features for Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit, including Large Subtitles, Large Text, Adjust Speed, Custom Difficulty and Select Difficulty. Its accessibility is strongest in Getting Started and Reading but it also has features in Navigation, Difficulty, Visual, Controls and Audio to reduce unintended barriers.
This report is created with input from accessibility experts and the player community to help people find games that have the accessibility features they require. Once you have found potential games on the database, there are excellent specialist accessibility sites that offer in-depth reviews to guide your purchasing decisions.
Accessibility Notes
There is a map of the course on the screen, although it is quite small. Because of the augmented nature of the game, you can choose to race-watching the car or the screen. You need the screen to see opponents and power-ups but well-marked-out time-trial races can be completed without looking at the screen.
A nice tip to make any of the tracks easier: take some detours between gates when mapping the course. When you race you can shortcut these while the AI characters follow them religiously.
Game Details
Release Date: 16/10/2020
Out Now: Switch
Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds
Players: 1-4
Genres: Physically Active, Race (Action, Collecting, Creative and Sports)
Accessibility: 24 features
Components: 3D Third-Person
Developer: Velan Ventures (@VelanVentures)
Costs: Purchase cost
Controls
We've documented 2 accessibility features for Controls in Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit which deal with how you control the game, different options for alternative inputs and whether you can remap these settings to suit your needs.
Gamepad
Can play with the following:
Multiple Buttons & Single Stick: Can play with multiple buttons and a stick.
Controller Vibration
Informative Vibration: Controller vibration indicates events or interactions in the game, echoing visual and audio cues. This can provide additional information about progress, approaching enemies or hitting a target.
Similar Games With More Accessibility Features for Controls
If you want to play Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit, but it doesn't offer the Controls accessibility features you require, these similar games extend the Controls accessibility:
- Hot Wheels Unleashed (10 Controls Features)
- You Suck at Parking (10 Controls Features)
- Mario Kart 8 Deluxe (9 Controls Features)
- Mario vs. Donkey Kong (5 Controls Features)
Difficulty
We've documented 3 accessibility features for Difficulty in Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit which deal with how you can adjust the challenge of play, and whether this is locked once chosen or can be adjusted as you play.
Difficulty Options
Select Difficulty: Select the level of difficulty from a range of presets. This not only offers a way to adjust the challenge of a game but enables you to do so without dealing with individual criteria.
Customise Difficulty: Customise different aspects of the game to create a challenge of an appropriate level. Adjusting elements individually enables you to tailor gameplay to suit your needs and style of play.
Adjust After Setting
Adjustable Anytime: You can adjust the difficulty while playing, without having to restart the level you are on. This enables you to quickly adjust the game to suit your needs and see the difference immediately.
Getting Started
We've documented 5 accessibility features for Getting Started in Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit which deal with what support is offered to get started with the game. This includes customising the experience when you first open the game via any onboarding processes it provides as well as tutorials and other assistance when you first start playing.
Assistance Getting Starting
These features aid your play of the game in terms of cognitive load on learning controls, dealing with pressure and coping with the environment and challenges.
Tutorials: There are helpful tutorials and instructions on how to play. Information is provided in a timely manner, with appropriate level of detail.
Practice Area: You can practice freely without opponents or time pressures. This can be a specific practice option, or the ability to play levels with the easiest opponents to improve understanding and skill.
View Control Mapping: You can view a map of controls during play. This clearly displays the mappings of actions to buttons/keys/mouse/keyboard without having to leave the game. This includes games that always display buttons to press during play.
Adjust Speed: Adjust the speed of the game at critical moments or throughout, or rewind play for a second attempt, to ease reaction times. By slowing the game, you have more time to interpret what is happening and then execute your actions. It also reduces the pressure on getting things right quickly or the first time you attempt them.
Assistance For Progressing
These features aid your progress through the game offering different ways of maintaining your progression.
Assisted Progress With Boosts: If you fail frequently the game automatically gets easier to ease the likelihood of failure. Or there’s an option to start this happening, like giving more health, lives or power each time you fail. Sometimes called Rubber Banding.
Similar Games With More Accessibility Features for Getting Started
If you want to play Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit, but it doesn't offer the Getting Started accessibility features you require, this similar game extends the Getting Started accessibility:
- Mario Kart 8 Deluxe (6 Getting Started Features)
Reading
We've documented 5 accessibility features for Reading in Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit which deal with how much reading or listening comprehension is required, how well the game provides visual and audible access to the text and whether subtitles and captions are a good fit for purpose.
Reading Level
How much reading is required to play the game's main path or story and how complex the language is. The presence of voiced characters doesn't reduce this requirement, as it's recorded as a separate datapoint.
No Reading: No reading is required, other than simple menus. The game either has no text or can communicate textual content with visuals and interactions. If reading isn't required because the text is voiced the All Dialogue is Voiced feature indicates this.
Text Visibility
Large Clear Text: All essential text is large and clear or can be adjusted to be. The general text used throughout the game in menus, instructions and other key information (excluding subtitles that are assessed separately) is at least 1/20 (46 pixels on 1080 screen) the height on landscape screens and at least 1/40 height on portrait screens. We base this on the full line-height, including the space above and below the letters.
Subtitles
Large Clear Subtitles: Subtitles are large, clear and of good contrast. They are at least 1/20 (46 pixels on 1080 screen) the height of a landscape screen and at least 1/40 height on portrait screens, or can be adjusted to be. We base this on the full line-height, including the space above and below the letters. Considered separately from the general text of the game, the subtitles are large, clear and of good contrast.
All Speech Subtitled (Or No Speech In Game): All spoken content has subtitles, or there is no speech in the game. This means there is no requirement to hear spoken dialogue or narrative to play the game.
Captions
Speaker Indicator: Textual captions indicate who is speaking (or there is only ever one person speaking). This can also be indicated visually in the game with character icons or placing text in speech bubbles next to the person speaking.
Navigation
We've documented 4 accessibility features for Navigation in Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit which deal with how the game provides guidance and assistance to navigate its worlds. These are only for games that have traversal and exploration in 2D and 3D spaces.
Clarity
Large Clear Navigation: The in-game navigation and maps are clear to read. They offer large text and offer markers that are large and of high contrast. Where text or information is small, there are settings to zoom-in and increase visibility.
Visual Directional Cues: Additional in-game visual cues that signpost where to go next and how close you are to arriving. This can be with camera movement to focus on your destination or important items. It can use light, breadcrumb trails, in-world pointers to identify your mission's target location.
Head-Up Display
Head-Up Display Navigation: Indication of where to go next with overlaid arrows, minimaps and waypoint markers. This supplements in-game visual and audible cues with additional guidance about where you are and where you need to go.
Game Map: View a map of the game world during play, with the landscape, points of interest and missions highlighted throughout the entire game. This enables the orientation of the player and the world, confirming a direction of movement and the location of destinations or points of exploration.
Similar Games With More Accessibility Features for Navigation
If you want to play Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit, but it doesn't offer the Navigation accessibility features you require, these similar games extend the Navigation accessibility:
- Mario vs. Donkey Kong (5 Navigation Features)
- You Suck at Parking (5 Navigation Features)
Visual
We've documented 3 accessibility features for Visual in Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit which deal with how you can adjust the visuals to suit your needs, and offer additional information if you can't hear the game.
Contrast
Medium Contrast: Game uses generally well contrasting and bright visuals, or has a slider to make this the case.
Audio Cues for Visual Events
Audio Cues for Visual Events: Audio is provided to indicate visual events. Game events or progress highlighted by visual icons, effects or animations are also accompanied by audio to signify that progress. This is useful for blind players.
Colour Options
Colour Blind Friendly: Game doesn’t rely on colour or can switch to colour blind friendly mode with double coding or similar way to avoid colour dependance.
Similar Games With More Accessibility Features for Visual
If you want to play Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit, but it doesn't offer the Visual accessibility features you require, these similar games extend the Visual accessibility:
- You Suck at Parking (6 Visual Features)
- Hotshot Racing (5 Visual Features)
- Mario vs. Donkey Kong (4 Visual Features)
- Ommy Kart (4 Visual Features)
Audio
We've documented 2 accessibility features for Audio in Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit which deal with how you can adjust the audio of the game and whether audio cues compensate for aspects of the game that are hard to see.
Audio Events
Visual Cues for Audio Events: Text or other visual indicators of audio events. This mirrors audio indicators of progress in the game with a corresponding visual indication.
Play Without Hearing
Play Without Hearing: No audio cues are necessary to play the game well.
Similar Games With More Accessibility Features for Audio
If you want to play Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit, but it doesn't offer the Audio accessibility features you require, these similar games extend the Audio accessibility:
- Hotshot Racing (3 Audio Features)
- Mario Kart 8 Deluxe (3 Audio Features)
System Accessibility Settings
In addition to the accessibility features provided in the game, you can also use system-wide accessibility settings:
Nintendo Switch
Nintendo Switch has some built-in features, including a lockable zoom, that can be used on all games.
Read more about system accessibility settings.
Accessibility Report supported by VSC Rating Board, PlayabilityInitiative and accessibility contributors Andy Robertson
