Get Started...
Android
iOS
Mac
Switch
Wii
Wii U
PC
PS4
PS5
Xbox One
Xbox X|SWe've documented 28 accessibility features for Resident Evil 4, including Fully Voiced (Or No Speech), Large Subtitles, Control Assists, Select Difficulty and No Repeated Pressing. Its accessibility is strongest in Controls and Reading but it also has features in Getting Started, Navigation, Audio, Difficulty and Visual 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.
Our accessibility examiner, Ben Kendall, first checked Resident Evil 4 accessibility 10 months ago.
Accessibility Notes
When you first open the game, there is a menu with basic options, such as subtitle selection and language. When you reach the start screen, you can go straight to the full options menu. There is an Accessibility tab which features three different presets: one for visual accessibility, one for auditory accessibility, and one for motion sickness. These presets adjust lots of different settings at once, but all options can still be adjusted individually.
You can individually choose to invert the camera controls for normal gameplay and aiming. There are three difficulties to choose from at the start of the game: Assisted; Standard; and Hardcore. Assisted has various features enabled such as aim assist and automatic health regeneration. If you choose Hardcore, you cannot change the difficulty without starting the game again. If you choose Standard, when you die you can choose to lower the difficulty to Assisted. You can enable several control assists such as auto-aim and auto-reload, but you still need quick reactions. You can disable the requirement to hold down buttons and rapidly press them, but sometimes pressing multiple simultaneously is required.
you can only manually save at certain points, but there is also an autosave feature that ensures you never lose too much progress if you die.
Text is all high in contrast but can be small. Subtitles and caption sounds, which mirror sounds that help you identify key pieces of information, such as whether you've been detected, can be made to be 1/20th the height of the screen. You can also change the colour of each speaker's dialogue.
You can adjust how much space parts of the HUD take up, and can disable the entire thing completely. Much of the game is quite low in contrast and dark. You can disable camera bob when running, but there is still camera shake and other screen effects throughout the game.
Game Details
Release Date: 11/01/2005, updated in 2023
Price: 75% off
Out Now: Android, GameCube, PC, PS2, PS3, PS4, PS5, Switch, Wii, Xbox One, Xbox X|S and iOS
Skill Rating: 14+ year-olds
Players: 1
Genres: Adventure, Shooting (Action, Fighting, Role-Play and Traversal)
Accessibility: 28 features
Components: 3D First-Person
Developer: Capcom USA (@CapcomUSA_)
Costs: Purchase cost, In-Game Purchases and In-Game Pass
Controls
We've documented 9 accessibility features for Controls in Resident Evil 4 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 & Two Sticks: Can play with multiple buttons and two sticks.
Mouse And Keyboard
Can play with the following:
Mouse and Keys: Can play with mouse and multiple keys.
Remap Controls
Can customise the controls for the game as follows:
Select Preset Controller Mappings: You can select preset button layouts from options provided by the developer.
Remap Mouse and Keyboard: Can remap mouse and keyboard key bindings, on systems that support these controls.
Invert X/Y Axis: Can invert the direction required to control looking and aiming. This enables you to match your instinctive orientation when looking.
Button Combinations
Specific button operation required to play
Holding Down Buttons Optional: Holding down buttons for prolonged periods (a second or more) is not required or can be switched to toggling the action on and off. This is in addition to the movement stick/button which is not considered a hold for this purpose.
Rapid Repeated Pressing Optional: Quick, repeated button pressing (more than 2 times a second) is not required, can be skipped or switched to holding a button to trigger a repeated action.
Controller Vibration
Vibration Optional: Controller vibration not used in the game or you can disable it.
Sensitivity
You can adjust
Adjust Mouse/Stick/Touch Sensitivity: Adjust how sensitive touch/mouse/stick controls are.
Similar Games With More Accessibility Features for Controls
If you want to play Resident Evil 4, but it doesn't offer the Controls accessibility features you require, these similar games extend the Controls accessibility:
- The Last Of Us Part II (12 Controls Features)
- Five Nights at Freddy's: Security Breach: Ruin (11 Controls Features)
- Alan Wake II (11 Controls Features)
- My Friendly Neighborhood (10 Controls Features)
Difficulty
We've documented 1 accessibility feature for Difficulty in Resident Evil 4 which deals 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.
Similar Games With More Accessibility Features for Difficulty
If you want to play Resident Evil 4, but it doesn't offer the Difficulty accessibility features you require, these similar games extend the Difficulty accessibility:
- The Last Of Us Part II (3 Difficulty Features)
- Alan Wake II (2 Difficulty Features)
- Atomic Heart (2 Difficulty Features)
- Dead Space (2 Difficulty Features)
Getting Started
We've documented 4 accessibility features for Getting Started in Resident Evil 4 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.
Onboarding Before Play
Before you are presented with the home screen, onboarding settings aim to aid you accessing the menus you need to adjust the game to your requirements. They can also provide an easier way of turning on important adjustments without digging through menus.
Onboarding: The first time you open the game, you are asked to confirm options for control, navigation and accessibility settings. Games can differ in what they present at this stage, but will count for this, provided they include a streamlined onboarding process.
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.
Assistance With Controls: The game can automatically assist with aiming, steering, reloading, jumping, running etc. This reduces the challenge of certain aspects of play to remove barriers and make control of characters more accessible.
Assistance For Progressing
These features aid your progress through the game offering different ways of maintaining your progression.
Save Progress Anytime: The game automatically saves progress or you can save any time. This doesn’t mean you never lose progress, but it does mean you can stop whenever you want (without having to get to a save point) without losing progress.
Similar Games With More Accessibility Features for Getting Started
If you want to play Resident Evil 4, but it doesn't offer the Getting Started accessibility features you require, these similar games extend the Getting Started accessibility:
- The Last Of Us Part II (11 Getting Started Features)
- My Friendly Neighborhood (5 Getting Started Features)
- Save Room (5 Getting Started Features)
- Horizon Zero Dawn (5 Getting Started Features)
Reading
We've documented 6 accessibility features for Reading in Resident Evil 4 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.
Simple Minimal Reading: Minimal reading is required. The quantity and complexity of reading are at a level that a primary/elementary student (9-year-old) could understand.
Text Visibility
High Contrast Text: Text colour contrasts to the background or can be adjusted to be. The text in menus, instructions and other information is presented in high contrast with a solid background.
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.
Voice Acted
All Dialogue is Voice Acted (Or No Speech In Game): All of the game dialogue and narrative can be voiced, or there is no speech in the game. This means there is no requirement to read the dialogue and narrative text to play the game.
Similar Games With More Accessibility Features for Reading
If you want to play Resident Evil 4, but it doesn't offer the Reading accessibility features you require, this similar game extends the Reading accessibility:
- The Last Of Us Part II (7 Reading Features)
Navigation
We've documented 4 accessibility features for Navigation in Resident Evil 4 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
Clear Mission Objectives: The game provides clear, structured missions with directional guidance and advice on which can be attempted next. This also indicates (ideally on maps where they are provided) which missions can't be attempted because you do not have the appropriate items yet.
Head-Up Display
Adjust Head-Up Display: Resize and adjust the content of the head-up display. This enables it to be made more visible. It can also enable the removal of too much information that can be distracting or confusing.
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.
Menu Navigation
Digital Menu Navigation: Menu choices with Gamepad can be made without using an analogue stick to guide a cursor to a selection. For example, using D-Pad, buttons or the Stick to change menu selection in a single action.
Similar Games With More Accessibility Features for Navigation
If you want to play Resident Evil 4, but it doesn't offer the Navigation accessibility features you require, these similar games extend the Navigation accessibility:
- Days Gone (7 Navigation Features)
- My Friendly Neighborhood (6 Navigation Features)
- Dead Space (6 Navigation Features)
- The Last Of Us Part II (6 Navigation Features)
Visual
We've documented 1 accessibility feature for Visual in Resident Evil 4 which deals with how you can adjust the visuals to suit your needs, and offer additional information if you can't hear the game.
Motion Sickness Friendly
Motion Sickness Friendly: Doesn't have 3D movement elements that may trigger motion sickness, like motion blur, depth of field and field-of-vision. Or includes the ability to disable motion blur, depth of field and field-of-vision effects.
Similar Games With More Accessibility Features for Visual
If you want to play Resident Evil 4, but it doesn't offer the Visual accessibility features you require, these similar games extend the Visual accessibility:
- My Friendly Neighborhood (7 Visual Features)
- Dead Space (7 Visual Features)
- The Last Of Us Part II (7 Visual Features)
- Bleak Sword DX (6 Visual Features)
Audio
We've documented 3 accessibility features for Audio in Resident Evil 4 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.
Adjustable Audio
Balance Audio Levels: Set music and game sound effects separately. This enables you to select your preference as well as ensure critical game sounds aren't obscured by other audio.
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.
System Accessibility Settings
In addition to the accessibility features provided in the game, you can also use system-wide accessibility settings:
Android
Android has accessibility settings including ways to navigate and interact, although not all games support this.
Nintendo Switch
Nintendo Switch has some built-in features, including a lockable zoom, that can be used on all games.
Nintendo Wii
The Wii has a few helpful settings, like disable rumble, but you have to use gesture controls for most games and the system menu.
PC
Windows has extensive accessibility features. Some, like colour correction, work with games. Lots of accessibility software can be used with PC games, from voice recognition to input device emulators.
PlayStation 4
PlayStation 4 has a range of accessibility settings. Some are system only, some work in games (invert colours and button mapping).
PlayStation 5
PlayStation 5 has a range of system-wide accessibility settings.
Xbox One
Xbox One has a system features, the excellent co-pilot share controls mode and adaptive controller support for all games.
Xbox Series X|S
Xbox One has a system features, the excellent co-pilot share controls mode and adaptive controller support for all games.
iOS
iOS has a very extensive suite of accessibility settings including ways to navigate with voice and comprehensive screen reading, though most of the features don't work with games.
Read more about system accessibility settings.
Accessibility Report supported by VSC Rating Board, PlayabilityInitiative and accessibility contributors Ben Kendall
