Dear AccessWorld readers,

At AFB, one event we look forward to every year is our annual AFB Leadership Conference, AFBLC. In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic began just before our conference, causing us to host that year's conference digitally. In 2021, with the pandemic still raging and with it being AFB's centennial year, instead of an annual conference, we hosted various digital events throughout the year to celebrate. I'm happy to announce that once again, we will be hosting an in-person AFB leadership conference this year. This year, the conference will take place on Monday May 2nd-Tuesday, May 3rd at the Hyatt Regency Crystal City at Reagan National Airport. Through April 15, the cost for the conference will be $399, changing to $449 afterwards. The full agenda can be found here but I thought I would specifically mention those events/sessions that might be of interest to AccessWorld readers specifically.

In our first set of breakout sessions on Monday, we have "Breakout #3: AFB’s Workplace Technology Study: Strategies for Welcoming Employees into an Accessible Workplace" which will discuss AFB's recent detailed study on technology use by people with vision loss in the workplace and where barriers still arise. In the second set of breakout sessions, we have both "Breakout #4: Using Technology to Enhance the Pre-Employment Experience: Smoothing Gen Z's Transition Into the Workforce" and "Breakout #6: Digital Inclusion: Public Policy Approaches to Website and App Accessibility (panel discussion with representatives from AFB, ACB, NFB, and NDRN)". On the second day, we have a session focused on the growing field of indoor navigation, "Breakout #12: Wayfinding Technology at Work: Tackling Indoor Navigation Challenges"

In addition to our breakout sessions, the 2022 AFB Leadership Conference will play host to two keynote speakers-Sachin Pavithran and Catarina Rivera. We also have a full list of speakers along with bios on our website.

AFB's CEO Kirk Adams specifically is looking forward to an Idea-a-thon Facilitated by JP Morgan Chase on Monday morning. He said "We have a tremendous line-up of speakers and programming this year. I’m most excited about a unique Idea-a-thon exercise hosted by our friends at JP Morgan Chase; panels on lifestyle and technology; presentations around all-important policy updates; and the opportunity to network with each other and key influencers spanning government to Hollywood."

I'm personally excited to see the Leadership Conference return once again. It is a unique conference that brings together the various focus areas in the blindness industry-from technology to advocacy. From someone who focuses on technology primarily, the learning and network opportunities at a holistic conference such as AFBLC is quite valuable. We hope to see you there.

Considering the gaming article in this issue of AccessWorld, I also wanted to mention a major development in a game we've covered previously-Blizzard's Hearthstone. If you are unfamiliar with the game, I recommend checking out this excellent article by J.J. Meddaugh detailing the game and its accessibility features. Compared to other games we have covered in AccessWorld, Hearthstone is interesting because it is a mainstream game which was made accessible by a third party. Over the years, new game modes have been added to Hearthstone, essentially becoming games in their own right. One of these game modes is called Battlegrounds. When the Hearthstone Access module first launched, the author focused on the original Hearthstone game mode and insured it was fully accessible before moving on to other modes. Recently, a major update to the module was released bringing accessibility to the popular Battlegrounds mode. In this mode, you face 7 other players in a game of strategy in which you aim to destroy their taverns while defending your own. Instead of using cards that you have collected, you recruit minions from a list provided to you. To learn more about this mode of the game, see this wiki page. If you have ever found the collection aspect of original Hearthstone daunting, Battlegrounds may be the game for you as it does not require the investment in gathering resources needed to excel in the traditional card game. For full details on Hearthstone accessibility, see the Hearthstone Access homepage.

As always, thank you for being AccessWorld readers and we hope you enjoy this issue.

Sincerely,

Aaron Preece

AccessWorld Editor and Chief

American Foundation for the Blind

This article is made possible in part by generous funding from the James H. and Alice Teubert Charitable Trust, Huntington, West Virginia.

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Accessible Science: Chemistry 101 Bill Holton

When his young son, Noah, lost most of his vision to bilateral retinal blastoma cancer, like most fathers, Bryan Shaw, PhD worried about his son’s education and future prospects. He also knew that earlier detection of Noah’s cancer might have saved more of his sight.

One of the early signs of retinal blastoma is known as leukocoria “leukos means white and kore means pupil.) “An abnormal light reflection in the eye can signify retinal blastoma, the onset of a cataract, a scarred retina or vitreous hemorrhage,” says Shaw. “The condition will show up most often in low light situations, or in photographs.”

Often in photos there is a phenomenon known as red eye, which is where the flash is reflected off the retina and the camera picks this up. But there is also what’s known as white eye, and it can show up long before a diagnoses of an eye problem. Noah’s cancer was spotted at four months, but reviewing baby pictures Shaw spotted the white eye in photos taken when his son was just twelve days old.

“His tumor may have been smaller then, more of his sight could have been saved,” he says. Shaw teamed up with computer scientists at Baylor University, where he is a professor of chemistry, and created a smartphone app that scans the user’s photo library and seeks out face shots that display white eye. The free app is called CRADLE and it combs through your photo library, flagging any photos displaying possible white eye. “I’ve heard from several parents telling me the app has helped them with early diagnosis,” says Shaw. Indeed, a recent study showed the app can diagnose retinal blastoma 1.3 months sooner than customary diagnosis, with only a 1% false negative rate. “We hope to reduce this to near zero with even more photos to scan,” says Shaw.

But Shaw had more to contribute. At one of Noah’s birthday parties a friend brought along his totally blind little boy. the professor watched with interest as the boy picked up several objects and explored them with his mouth. Days later he was eating blackberries, exploring their texture with his tongue, when it occurred to him what a remarkable touch organ it is.

“The tongue is one of the earliest body parts to form. Some children even explore their environment with the tongue in vitro,” he notes. The tongue is what’s known as a hydrostat, muscular tissue not supported, or limited, by bone. “This it can wiggle into tiny nooks and crevices your fingers can’t reach.” The brain centers that create tongue and fingertip images are very close, and though there are about the same number of touch receptors in both, the tongue has a .58milimeter touch resolution, the fingertips nearly twice that. “We need to know what to eat and what to spit out,” says Shaw. “Exploring with the tongue is also important in language development.” And as Shaw learned, it can even help in the study of chemistry. At Baylor Shaw studies proteins: large, complex molecules that play many critical roles in the body.

“One of the textbooks I use has over 1,100 illustrations of various proteins, and I began to wonder how someone like my son would fare trying to visualize them,” says Shaw. “Which is sort of ironic, considering none of us can actually see them--we have to use illustrations and models.”

Shaw began using his lab’s 3D printer to create tactile models of various proteins, some as large as melons. But after his insight regarding the tongue he decided to go in the other direction.

“I began printing models as tiny as a peanut, even a grain of rice, designed to be explored via the tongue,” he says. “I did include eyelets to attach safety cords so they wouldn’t be a choking hazard.” Shaw sent a package of his models to Kate Fraser, a science teacher at the Perkins School for the Blind. “I sent models of Carbonic Anhydrase, which is the drug target to help treat glaucoma,” he says. “They proved to be excellent hands-on models to help our students understand more about proteins and enzymes as one of the most important examples of proteins,” says Fraser. “I was so happy to have such excellent 3-D models to support our students' learning experience. Multi-sensory teaching is so beneficial to all students.”

Shaw also began creating protein models using dental resin, which allowed him to make tiny food-safe silicon molds of the protein structures. He then filled these molds with edible treats-- “gummy bear” gelatin, chocolate, even taffy. “This way students can learn about proteins, and when they’re done enjoy a sweet treat reward.”

Shaw envisions future chemistry textbooks that come complete with 3D models shrink wrapped to an included sheet of carboard. In the meantime, “Anyone with a 3D printer can make their own molds for about fifty cents each using the Protein Data Bank.

At 13 Noah is demonstrating a decided interest in science, but regardless of whether or not he takes up chemistry 3D models will be useful to all students – sighted and blind. “The end goal is to make chemistry imagery and labs accessible to the vision impaired and encourage their input and participation,” says Shaw, who is currently mentoring a blind chemistry graduate student. “Chemistry and other sciences can only benefit from a wider diversity of perspectives and ideas.”

The Unseen Advantage

One chemist who agrees wholeheartedly with Shaw’s sentiment is Mona Minkara, PhD, a computational chemist at Northeastern University.

“My group wants to understand the components of lung surfactants — complex substances that keep our air sacs from collapsing,” says Minkara, who is blind. “Bioengineers would like to make synthetic surfactants to treat lung disease, but we must understand the real ones first.”

Minkara is not a stereotypical, storybook chemist, mixing beakers of frothing compounds and lighting a Bunsen burner to see what explodes.

“As a computational chemist, I don’t work with chemicals in the lab. Instead I model various proteins and molecules on computers and run simulations and calculations to determine how they move and interact.”

Most sighted computational chemists visualize their proteins by calling up a program that displays their shapes and how they move. Instead, Minkara mathematically plots the movement and often is able to detect patterns that her sighted colleagues might miss.

“I call it my unseen advantage,” Minkara smiles, and relates how it helped her field multiple job offers shortly after her post-doc work.

“First I had to demonstrate to prospective employers that I have the knowledge and can do the job,” she recalls. “But I also offered examples of how my different perspective and ways of doing things had its own value. Yes, I would require some reasonable accommodations, but when balanced against the total budget on the program and my value as a potential team member was it really going to be that significant of an expense?”

Hoping to encourage other vision impaired students into chemistry and other sciences, Minkara maintains a personal website, where she shares her story:

“When I was seven, I was diagnosed with macular degeneration and cone-rod dystrophy. One specialist told my mother that it was not worth it to spend a penny on my education…" and describes her educational journey from Boston schools to Wellesley College to a PhD from the University of Florida. She also outlines in detail the roster of accessibility tools and resources she uses in her research and teaching duties. “It requires a lot of hacks,” she says. “But then as a blind person, isn’t that what we already do?”

In a further effort to encourage STEM education for the blind Minkara and two of her colleagues have created a tactile molecular molecule kit and a braille Periodic Table they hope to soon be able to offer in a “buy one have one donated” model. She’s also developed the curriculum and for the past two summers helped run a two-week summer chemistry camp designed for blind and blindfolded sighted kids. Says Minkara, “We show them it’s possible to perform all manner of science experiments without sight, from building that first school volcano all the way to extracting DNA from strawberries.”

We’ll conclude with a few comments from Dr. Minkara’s website:

The scientific world is very visual and designed for sighted individuals. But I believe it is a hindrance to continue to process everything in the same manner; science requires unique perspectives to tackle problems and develop solutions. People with disabilities and people from different backgrounds will bring those unique perspectives to the table—we are not a burden and can be positive contributors if given the proper tools.

If I could go back and speak to my younger self, I would tell her that scientific vision is more—so much more—than sight.

This article is made possible in part by generous funding from the James H. and Alice Teubert Charitable Trust, Huntington, West Virginia.

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Reading AccessWorld Made Easy Deborah Kendrick

One thing I know for sure about technology: there is always more than one way to get things done! That rule applies to keystrokes, applications, and categories of tasks.  Would you like your screen reader to read continuously? One command for this in Jaws is Insert-down arrow; another, perfectly serviceable way to get the job done is by pressing Insert-a. Want to answer a call on your iPhone? Two finger double tap works. And so does flicking right until your VoiceOver says “Answer Call” and then double tapping there with one finger. Or, for yet another alternative, wear a headset and press or tap on the device’s control as directed.

The point of all this musing is that when it comes to reading AccessWorld, there is also more than one way to enjoy each and every issue.

Using the Website

Each month when a new issue of AccessWorld goes live, many readers read it right there on the web site, opening a browser of choice and savoring (we hope) each informative article. You can do that, of course, at work or at home, at your desk or wherever else you might access the internet with your computer, tablet, or smartphone.  If that’s your preferred method, all you have to do is open a browser of choice, type www.AFB.org/AW in the address bar, and wait for the fun to begin. If you missed an issue aand want to revisit it, or want to take a look through the AccessWorld back catalog, you can visit www.afb.org/aw/backissues. Also remember that you can read any issue of AccessWorld all on one page; on every table of contents page, there is a link to do so just after the link to the last article in the issue. In Apple's iOS, you can even save this webpage to certain apps for offline reading. For example, if you activate the "Share" option on this webpage in Safari, near the bottom of the list of share options is an option titled "Save to Voice Dream" (only appearing if you have the app installed) which will save the issue to the Voice Dream Reader app. This may be true for other apps as well.

If you are on a desktop computer, you can also generally save an entire issue of AccessWorld for offline reading or for use on a digital book player like the Victor Reader Stream. Most internet browsers will have a "Save" option in their main or file menus that will allow you to save your current webpage. You can also press CONTROL + "S" to access this feature directly. On windows, you want to press the "TAB" key to move from the field where you choose the name of the file to the combox where you choose what file format you want to use when saving. A good option is generally something like "Webpage, Single file" or "Webpage, HTML Only" to have the issue be saved in a format you can simply navigate to and launch and or move to a digital book player.

Many readers, however, enjoy a simpler, more streamlined approach to reading our magazine. For a reading experience that allows you to skip around within an issue of AccessWorld, jump forward or back with ease, and/or save an article for later, try reading AccessWorld with NFB NEWSLINE.

What is NFB NEWSLINE?

If you’re not already familiar with NFB NEWSLINE, here’s a brief description. Begun some 25 years ago, NFB NEWSLINE is a service provided by the National Federation of the Blind to blind and print disabled people. The service is free and you only need prove eligibility to participate. If you’re already a patron of the National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled, for instance, that will serve as proof of eligibility.  NFB NEWSLINE offers access to some 500 newspapers and magazines, as well as    weather alerts, job listings, TV listings, and various store ads. Once you have an account, you can access it any time and there are several paths to doing so.

Originally, NFB NEWSLINE was designed to be accessed with a telephone. Today, you can also access NFB NEWSLINE through smartphone apps or your Amazon Echo. I’m going to talk about my own two favorite approaches here: 1) dialing in from any phone or 2) accessing NEWSLINE content with a braille display.

The telephone approach

Originally, NFB NEWSLINE was designed for use with landline phones (remember those?) Many users do still read their favorite publications with that nostalgic device. Although I let go my landline years ago, I still use a simple phone call to reach NFB NEWSLINE. Just add your local NFB NEWSLINE numbers to your contacts, or dial the number from your smartphone or other cell phone’s keypad. The system will recognize your number, ask for verification that you are you, and present the first menu.  You can choose from newspapers, magazines, set up a favorites list, or follow a path to pick up reading where you were last interrupted, and more. Using your telephone keypad to issue commands, you can navigate by publication, article, sentence, word, or character. You can speed up and slow down the speech, spell a word, change the speaking voice, and email material to yourself for archiving on your own computer or mobile device.

Walk the Walk

Remember, there is more than one way to do most things with technology, and locating your favorite publication on NFB NEWSLINE is no exception. 

I’ll walk you through the steps I take to read AccessWorld via NFB NEWSLINE with the telephone. I’m using an iPhone 12 Pro, but remember, you could follow these same steps from any phone with a key pad. I have the local phone number (for my particular city) for accessing NFB NEWSLINE in my contacts, so I just say “Call NFB NEWSLINE” to Siri and the call is made. I hear a welcome message and am prompted to Press 1 if I am Ms. Kendrick. I am and I do. Then, I am offered a menu of choices. 

One of these choices is Favorites. If a publication is in my Favorites, I begin there. Another choice is Subscriber’s Control Panel, and if I go there, I will have the option there to begin reading where I last left off. If I was reading AccessWorld on my last visit to the service, I will select this option and the system will resume reading on the same article from the same  issue that I was enjoying during my last NFB NEWSLINE session.

Finally, and here’s the approach I personally usually take, the option is offered to press 7 from the Main Menu, which takes the listener to Magazines. Here, you will reach a sub menu of magazine categories. All Magazines, choice #1, lists all magazines on the system, arranged alphabetically. Sometimes, this approach could be tedious, but since AccessWorld is near the beginning of the alphabet, it comes up as one of the first five. The next category is Blindness Specific magazines, and from this list, AccessWorld comes up as number 2. (Other magazine categories, incidentally, include areas like fashion, family, news, general interest, and more, but we’re looking for AccessWorld in this exercise.)

Again, there is always more than one way to get to your desired destination. Once you have chosen the magazine, NFB NEWSLINE offers you available issues, usually the two or three most recently published. Upon choosing your issue, you are again presented with a menu, from which you can select individual articles or sections. In this and all NEWSLINE publications, you also have the option of simply pressing #99, which will begin at the beginning of the chosen issue and read straight through the entire publication.

By using your phone’s keypad, you can move forward and back by paragraph or word or skip an article altogether.

If you want to read an article a second time or examine it with closer scrutiny for any reason, you can email it to yourself. As long as you have an email address on file with NFB NEWSLINE, you can choose to email sections from any publication to yourself.  When you press pound 9 to interrupt reading, you are offered the choices of pressing #2 for this particular article, #3 for the section, or 4 for the entire publication. In other words, you could simply begin reading AccessWorld at the beginning of an issue, press pound-9 followed by 4, and send the entire issue to your email inbox.

Reading AccessWorld in Braille

A number of braille displays now offer NFB NEWSLINE as an available online service for download. At this writing, devices known to have this capability include the Chameleon and Mantis from the American Printing House for the Blind, the Brailliant BI 20X and 40X from HumanWare, and the NLS e Readers. (These are the devices offering direct download from NFB NEWSLINE; owners of other braille displays may read these files by more indirect means.) 

With one of the displays mentioned here, you can log in once to your NFB NEWSLINE account, and select the publications you wish to download. Those publications will then be downloaded directly to your device.

If you choose not to have content deleted automatically, you also will then have the ability to save older issues for reading later.

Subscribing to NEWSLINE

If you are not already subscribed to NEWSLINE, the process is easy.

Call (866) 504-7300. Or visit: https://NFBNEWSLINEONLINE.org and look for the words “Sign Up.” Here, you can either complete the application online or follow instructions for printing and mailing. The service is free of charge to all eligible individuals.

This article is made possible in part by generous funding from the James H. and Alice Teubert Charitable Trust, Huntington, West Virginia.

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Janet Ingber

If you are looking for fun and accessible games to play, I have some suggestions. In this article I will review Solve the Outbreak, Blind Drive, and BattleFruit. For Blind Drive and BattleFruit, I used an iPhone 13 running iOS 15.3.1. I played Stop the Outbreak on an M1 Mac running macOS Monterey 12.2.1 on the CDC’s website since it is not available for iPhone. At the time of writing, mid-February 2022, these three apps are not verified for macOS. However, they are in the Mac App Store. I also included Android links for Solve the Outbreak and Blind Drive.

Solve the Outbreak

This game was developed by the CDC and can be played on iPad, Android, iOS, and on your computer. The CDC website has the standard game and link for a Section 508 accessible version. There is also a link to download an accessible version for iOS and Android. The Section 508 version does not give you the opportunity to answer questions. Answers are given as part of the original text.

Stop the Outbreak works on Chrome, Firefox, Opera, Safari, and IE10+. JavaScript must be enabled. Safari on Windows must have QuickTime installed. This game uses local storage, which must not be erased in order to save game progress.

The developer describes the game as “Your mission, if you choose to accept, is to get clues and analyze data to solve the outbreak and save lives! In this fun app, you get to be a Disease Detective.”

Getting Started

I played the standard game, not the Section 508 version, and found that the easiest way to navigate is to use VO-Right Arrow and VO-Left Arrow.

Once on the CDC page, use headings navigation to get to the game. Before doing anything else, either use form navigation or VO-Right Arrow to get to the Settings menu. In the menu is an option to toggle sound. You can also erase or reset scores.

Next, either use form navigation or VO-Right Arrow until you hear VoiceOver say, “Tap here to select level 1.” On the new screen, you are prompted to select a mission. You need to VO-Right Arrow until you hear, “Breathless in the Midwest.” That is the name of the first mission. Headings navigation can get you to some of the missions, but not “Breathless in the Midwest. Each mission gives you some information including where the outbreak has happened, symptoms, and how many people are sick. At the bottom of the description is the Start button.

Solving the Mission

When the new screen loads, you will be on a heading called, “Your Mission.” Below the heading is information about the outbreak and instructions for you to follow. Activate the “I accept this mission.” button. It is located beneath the options to share or tweet about the game.

On the next screen, you will have your first clue. Throughout the game while reading the information and clues, you will encounter links. They contain useful data and will help you to answer questions.

After reviewing all the material, VO-Right Arrow until you hear, “Answer this question.” There are three possible responses. If you answer the question correctly you get points and you hear a ding sound. If the question is answered incorrectly, you will hear a buzz sound. Below the question is an explanation why your answer is correct or incorrect. Beneath the explanation is a button to get your next clue.

After you have answered all questions for mission, activate the Results button. Activating it brings up a new screen with your total points and status. There are options to re-set your scores or erase them. There is also a button to solve another outbreak.

Conclusion

This game works well on the CDC website. In addition to being an interesting game, you can learn a great deal about disease outbreaks.

Blind Drive

Blind Drive is developed by Lo-Fi People and can be played on iOS, Android, and on Windows and Mac. The game is $3.99 on moble platforms, and $9.99 on Windows and Mac. Note that the game contains swearing and cartoonish violence.

The game is described as “Blind Drive is an audio-based, black comedy arcade action game. You’re blindfolded and going against traffic. Cars rushing past, angry drivers yelling at you. Cops on your tail. And you can’t see a thing. Can you do it?”

Getting Started

This game has an accessibility mode. Once the game is on, turn accessibility on or off with a three finger triple tap. It can also be turned on or off via the Start menu. Have direct touch enabled for Blind Drive. Go to Settings>Accessibility>VoiceOver>Rotor Actions>Direct Touch Apps. Select Blind Drive from the app list. When Blind Drive begins, you will hear a car engine starting and a car radio playing in the background. Then VoiceOver will start speaking the main menu. The first item is to continue a game that you have started. The next item is to start a new game. Next is a choice to start a new chapter. The final menu item is Choose Options.

The first option category is Game Settings. Your first choice is to pick whether the game is easy, normal or hard. The second choice is whether you get haptic feedback. The next option is Tilt Controls. This lets you tilt your device to turn, rather than pressing and holding the screen. To me, it feels more like turning a steering wheel. The next setting is Blindfold Mode. Sighted users can play with a blank screen. Your final option is Game Center.

The next option category is Audio. This is where you control music volume, headphones, and can do a quick sound check. Next are options to choose a language, use subtitles, and turn accessibility on or off. The final menu item is How to Play. Activating this will give you clear directions for playing the game. I highly recommend reviewing this section.

Playing Blind Drive

Each game consists of several chapters. For each chapter of a game you have three lives. If you make it through a chapter without losing all three lives, you can advance to the next chapter. While playing, there is no confirmation that you have advanced to the next chapter. The next time you play, the chapters you have completed will be listed. If you need to pause the game, double tap on the upper left side of the screen. If you are repeating a chapter and want to skip dialogue you have already heard, double tap on the upper right corner of the screen.

In Blind Drive, you are a test subject in a driving blind experiment. The experimenter will contact you periodically and give you instructions. As each chapter progresses, the driving gets harder. While driving, you will have additional distractions such as phone calls and bicyclists. You just need to follow the instructions given by the experimenter.

In the first chapter of the first game, you will hear cars passing on the left and right. Your job is to steer in the opposite direction to avoid the cars. Remember to turn back to center when the car has passed. As the game progresses, there are more challenges and levels get harder.

Conclusion

I enjoy simulated driving. Instructions are simple and given throughout the game. If you are offended by profanity or violence, this is not a game for you.

BattleFruit

The developer is very concerned about accessibility. During development, AppleVis users were asked for suggestions and recommendations, and comments received responses. AppleVis is a great resource for blind and visually impaired users of Apple products. This game is developed by Guappa Desarrollo Integral SL and is available for iPhone and iPad. This game is not available in the Google Play Store. The developer describes the game as: “TONS OF RECIPES More than 1000 levels, fruits of all sorts and shapes, and 5 types of kitchen utensils to catch all the fruits.”

Getting Started

The basic idea of BattleFruit is to get all the fruits you need for a recipe. Collect all of your opponent’s fruits before your opponent gets yours. You do this with a variety of utensils. The game consists of two boards. The bottom board has your fruits and your opponent tries to get them. The fruits are labeled but your opponent cannot see them. The top board is your opponent’s. These fruits are not labeled.

The game board consists of cells, each with a letter and number. The letters indicate the row and the number indicates the column. Boards are not always square.

At the top left of the home screen is a Settings button. Here is where you can control music volume and sound effects volume. I recommend turning sound effects volume on. There are helpful sounds including music to let you know when it is your turn. Next is a list of color scheme options. This is followed by an option to turn vibration on or off. The next option is to have bigger buttons on the screen.

You then need to pick a name for your avatar. By default, it is Chef 1. Just below the name is a button to change your name. Each time you press the button, a different name will be spoken. Choose the one you like. You can change your avatar’s name as often as you wish.

After the Settings button is a Help button. Topics covered include what each utensil does, the game board, and how to win the game.

The final controls on the home screen are Multi Player and Play BattleFruit.

Playing BattleFruit

When the game screen loads, the first thing to do is choose a recipe. A new screen will then load and different music will play. If you turn sound effects off you will not hear this music or any other game sounds. VoiceOver will tell you how many of each utensil you have.

At the top of the screen is a “Give Up” button and a button to access the game tutorial. Between the two boards there are two buttons, “Shake Your Fruit” and “Start”. The Shake Your Fruit buttons rearranges your fruits on the lower board. It is not required that you do this. Activate the Start button when you are ready to begin.

Once it is pressed, VoiceOver says who starts the game. Move around the board by flicking left and right. Choose your utensil by flicking up or down. When you choose a fork, VoiceOver may say the word ‘activate’ instead of the word ‘fork.’ Once you choose a cell, do not double tap it. If you do, a fork will go to that cell. If you want to use a fork on that cell, you can double tap it. If you want a different utensil, just lift your finger off the cell. Next, choose your utensil. Once you have made your selection, double tap on it. The utensil will make a sound as it hits the cell or cells. VoiceOver will say whether it hit fruit, part of a fruit, an ice cube, or you missed. If you hit an ice cube, you lose a turn. This same sequence will occur when your opponent uses a utensil. You will hear three musical notes after each player takes a turn. You will hear some music when all the parts of a fruit have been caught. There is also music when you get the whole fruit at one time. Between the two boards is a drawer where you can  take out or purchase more utensils. Next is a list of your available utensils. Finally, there is a description of moves already made and which made fruits each of you have caught.

Getting More Utensils

You will automatically be given at least one utensil every 12 hours when you open the game. You can purchase utensils through the Drawer, which is located on the left side of the screen between the two boards. All your available utensils will also be in the drawer.

Double tap on the Drawer and it will open. VoiceOver will say, “Take utensils from the Drawer.” Flick right to hear the name of each utensil and how many of them you have. Take a utensil out of the Drawer by double tapping on it. It will be moved to your list of utensils in the game.

Flick left and there is a button to buy more utensils. There are several options including buying 5 of each utensil for 99 cents or 25 of each utensil for $2.99. Double tap on the Drawer button to close it.

Winning the Game

When the game is over, you will hear longer music. If you won, there will be clapping after the music. At the top of the screen is the result of the game and below it is a Next button. This will bring you back to the Recipe screen. If you won, you will get stars. The amount is next to the completed recipe. The number of stars you get depends on how well you did against your opponent. If you are using Game Center, there are additional achievements you can get with stars.

A Close button is in the upper left. It will bring you back to the main screen.

Conclusion

BattleFruit is a fun game to play. You have to think about which utensils to use and where to use them.

The Bottom Line

All these games are very accessible with VoiceOver. I enjoy playing them and I hope you do, too.

This article is made possible in part by generous funding from the James H. and Alice Teubert Charitable Trust, Huntington, West Virginia.

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