When the 2018 God of War game was ported to PC, developer Santa Monica Studio added some extra features to help make the game more widely accessible. Thankfully, it’s now confirmed to not only be including these features for the sequel, God of War Ragnarok, but also adding even more.
In a recent PlayStation Blog post, lead UX designer Mila Pavin outlined the studio’s plans for the sequel. It will retain and expand upon all the accessibility options from the first game, as well as boast more customization for the combat and interaction systems, rebuilt controller mapping, and a redesigned UI. While not all the accessibility features have been listed, Pavin did share what they believe to be the most notable additions, plus some of the returning ones.
God of War Ragnarok – returning accessibility features from God of War for PC
- Auto Sprint – Activate this and you’ll automatically start sprinting while moving in one direction for enough time instead of needing to click the analog stick. You can even determine how long it takes for Kratos to start sprinting.
- Aim Style & Block Style – You can choose whether your aim and block stances are toggled by holding down a button or simply pressing it.
- Persistent Dot – This turns on a colored dot that will remain in the center of the screen. The dot comes in one of three different sizes and seven different colors. This can be used to keep you informed of where the center of the screen is and reduce motion sickness.
God of War Ragnarok – new accessibility features
- Subtitle & Caption Improvements – Aside from bringing back the option to list speaker names and add a background to subtitles (both of which were in the last game), Santa Monica is providing more options for how subtitles and captions can be displayed. You’ll be able to change their size, their color, and blur the background behind subtitles to make them easier to read during “complex scenes.”
- Captions are also being expanded to help players understand in-game sounds and can be used to help solve puzzles. You’ll even have an option to toggle on a direction indicator to tell you where sounds are coming from, making it useful for puzzles that make use of sound cues.
- Text/Icon Size – This one’s self-explanatory and ties back to Santa Monica’s redesigning of the UI. God of War Ragnarok will now feature a larger minimum text size that can be further scaled, and important icons can be made bigger too to make them easier to see when playing on the couch.
- Controller Remapping – Aside from a wide range of preset layouts, you’ll be able to customize your button configurations to your liking. There will also be touch pad shortcuts for slightly more complex actions like Spartan Rage and Quick Turn, which normally require multiple button inputs.
- High Contrast Mode – This mode allows you to apply different colors to characters, enemies, items, special effects, and more to help make them more visible. You can adjust the individual colors for each type of in-game object, select mid-tone or darkened background contrast levels, and even set whether to have the mode active all the time or only during gameplay.
- Navigation Assist – By pressing a single button, the camera will orient your view so you know which direction to go in for your next objective.
- Traversal Assistance – Features like jumping gaps, mantling, and vaulting can be done automatically based on which direction you press. This feature can be altered to include climbing and crawling so any and all traversal can be made much simpler to do.
- Audio Cues – On-screen prompts can now be accompanied by specific sounds to alert you to when they’re available. This also extends to combat cues like unblockable attack rings, targeting aim cues, and weapon swap cues. You can alter the sound of these cues separately from other volume sliders.
Santa Monica promises over 60 accessibility features in total. Aside from the ones listed above, it has also teased combat/aim assists, puzzle/minigame assists, HUD adjustments, camera tuning, and auto pick up.
