Deaf Game Review – RAD

Coty Craven2 minute read

RAD Deaf Accessibility

Score

8.3 out of 10

Pros

  • Dialogue is text-only, so it's all nicely subtitled, two size options for subtitle text, speaker labels

Cons

  • The large text size is a little buggy and therefore hard to read (and it won't be large enough for some players)
Above score was automatically converted from 0-6 scale to a 0-10 scale.

Game reviewed on PS4

RAD is a rad new game from Double Fine in which you play as one of many possible children sent out by your village elder to save the world, with your fancy new body modified courtesy of the elder. Your new body allows the radiation to work in your favor, giving you a whole host of mutations that weaponize your body. Mutations are random and different for every run through the game, so you never know what weird benefits you’ll end up having. It’s a great quick-fix sort of game that I had a lot of fun with.

Making RAD even more rad is the nice Deaf/hoh accessibility (and general assist options) included in the game.

Assist features menu

The assists allow players to customize how they want to experience the game and get a little help where they might need it.

There’s also the option to choose larger text for subtitles and subtitles are always on because the voice acting in RAD is minimal. Another nice feature is a slider for text speed.

Gameplay options menu

The larger size text presents in a little bit of a buggy manner though, with the line spacing kind of a mess:

Cutscene image taken to illustrate buggy looking large text size option.

This minor issue aside, the subtitles are easily legible thanks to the box they’re presented on and there are speaker labels with an image of whoever is speaking.

Dialogue screen showing the photo of the NPC speaking.

RAD is a very visual game with everything important being conveyed in a visual manner, from damage:

Fight scene with red border around the edge of the screen indicating damage.

To enemy health levels:

Enemy shown with small health bar above its head.

Not pictured are the helpful icons that indicate you can pick up an item.

All in all, RAD is a readily accessible game for Deaf/hoh players and a fun roguelike quick-fix game. Definitely worth checking out if you, too, want to be able to maybe poop out miniature you’s to aid you in a fight (and any number of very strange mutations).

Enjoy our work? Please consider supporting us!

Donating through DAGERSystem / AbilityPoints with PayPal may be tax deductible

Coty
CravenFormer Director of Operations and Workshop FacilitatorThey/Them

Founder of CIPT and former Director of Operations and Business Development. He/They

See all articles by Coty

Follow CIPT

Latest from CIPT

(Opens in new tab) starting with