As the most popular platform for PC gaming, Steam has a ton of inclusivity features, filters, and so on, but Valve is always keen to develop. Last year, we saw an overhaul that brought us the new-look Steam Families feature, as well as a neat change that makes it obvious when game reviewers are using a Steam Deck. And now, the newly announced accessibility support aims to make it easier for users to find games that are more easily accessible to them.

Whether these be gameplay options, such as difficulty settings, or settings designed to help gamers with disabilities, Valve wants to bring these details to the store page and make them transparent via new tags. While developers can now start to add these tags to their games, players won’t see the results until “later this year,” according to an official blog post.

Accessibility support on Steam

Valve says that the Steam store and desktop client “will soon be able to help players find games that feature accessibility support,” and it’s up to developers to start making this happen. New tags can be applied through what is known as the ‘Accessibility Feature Wizard’, where devs can “self-identify” the level of accessibility in their games.

Steamworks has a new accessibility-support questionnaire for developers to better describe the way their games support accessibility. If your game supports Accessibility features, you can now specify that information within Steamworks.

• Gameplay options, like adjustable difficulty
• Audio accessibility features, including custom volume controls and narrated game menus
• Visual accessibility features, including adjustable text size and color alternatives
• Input options, which include chat speech-to-text and text-to-speech

Source: Steam Community

As for what players will see later in the year, the new filters will be applicable to Steam store searches (within the filters menu) and will be displayed on a game’s store page on the right-hand side, along with current details such as controller support and Steam Deck compatibility.

You can learn more about the new accessibility features and the tags you can expect to see here. A couple that stuck out to us include ‘Save Anytime’ and ‘Playable without Timed Inputs’.

About the Author

Jack Goodall

At PC Guide, Jack is mostly responsible for reporting on hardware deals. He also specializes in monitors, TVs, and headsets and can be found putting his findings together in a review or best-of guide.