Reflections

Vibe-Coding: How the Blind Community is Making Video Games Accessible

Episode Summary

Jacob Shymanski loves to play video games, and when he lost his sight, he felt that one of his favourite hobbies had been taken away from him. Native accessibility in video games is not common practice, and it takes hours and hours to modify a video game and make it accessible. That’s where a community of people on Discord using Claude code comes in. Using an AI chat bot, novice and experienced software developers are creating their own video game mods to make more video games accessible. Jacob and his three guests teach us how Claude works, how mods work, and explores some of the legal and ethical debates surrounding vibe-coding. Aaron created mods for Rimworld, a popular indie game, and demonstrates how he uses Claude Code to write these accessibility mods. Plus, he weighs in on if the cost of this software is worth it. Rashad shares how he, as someone with no experience in software development or coding, got started using Claude and the impact these accessible games have had on the disability community. Bradley created his first Slay the Spire mod by rewriting the code manually and explains how much quicker it was to create the mod for Slay the Spire 2 with Claude Code.