When a single-player game’s default challenge or controls create a barrier, the player should have meaningful ways to adjust the experience instead of being forced to restart—or give up. That does not mean every game needs automatic difficulty or that one setting suits everyone. It means offering choice, making it easy to find, and letting players decide what works for them.
Can you change the difficulty after you start?
Ideally, yes. The Game Accessibility Guidelines recommend allowing difficulty to change during play, including through settings or when a player dies. That gives someone who discovers a mismatch after starting a way to respond without losing progress or beginning again.
The guideline also describes adaptive difficulty: “This can also be achieved through adaptive difficulty – dynamically adjusting the difficulty level according to the performance of the player.” Manual adjustment and adaptive difficulty are different choices. A manual option keeps the decision with the player; an adaptive system changes challenge based on performance. Neither approach will suit every player, so automatic adjustment should not be the only route.
Can you adjust one part of the challenge without making the whole game easy?
A broad easy-to-hard selector is a useful starting point, but it can change several aspects of play at once. A player may want to reduce enemy speed without changing puzzle difficulty, or adjust enemy AI while keeping other challenges intact.
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The guidelines recommend offering a wide choice of difficulty levels, and their fine-tuning guidance suggests exposing individual gameplay variables, with examples such as AI level, enemy speed and puzzle difficulty. As the guidelines put it: “It also allows gameplay to be tailored to the unique needs of each individual player, rather than being funnelled into simplistic general “difficulty” buckets which may not match up with the areas of gameplay that each player finds a particular barrier and which they do not.”
More controls are not automatically better: a long, unexplained settings screen can itself be hard to use. Group related options clearly and offer understandable presets as a quick starting point, while allowing players to refine individual variables if they want. The design trade-off is between a simple choice and enough control to address a specific barrier.
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How should games present adjustment options?
- Let players change settings during play. Avoid requiring a restart simply because the original choice no longer fits.
- Explain what each option changes. Clear descriptions help players make an informed choice without trial and error.
- Make accessibility information and settings easy to find. The Game Accessibility Guidelines’ full list includes recommendations on discoverability and remembered settings.
- Use respectful labels. An easier setting should not be presented with mocking or demeaning language.
These are practical recommendations, not a promise that any particular feature will work for every game or player. A fixed, demanding challenge can be a deliberate creative choice; the case for adjustment is strongest when players can make informed choices rather than being locked into a single mode by default.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.When might alternative input hardware help?
Software options change how a game behaves; alternative input hardware can address some physical input needs. Adaptive switches and other peripherals may be relevant for some players, but suitability depends on the individual, the game’s input support and the platform’s compatibility. A device is not a substitute for accessible game design, and no accessory works for everyone.
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AbleGamers Foundation’s 2021 public disclosure reported 1,617 adaptive switches, mounts and other peripherals granted to organizations, and adaptive equipment received by more than 300 individuals with disabilities. These are historical program figures, not an estimate of how many players need hardware and not evidence of current availability, pricing or compatibility for a particular product.
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