The folks over at AbleGamers have given SWTOR a massive thumbs up, naming it their 2011 Accessible Mainstream Game of the Year Award. Their bouquets are numerous:

This game performed strongly against most of our accessibility tests while still maintaining a fun environment for those who enjoy solo or group play. Perhaps one of the most unintentionally accessibility features turned out to be the addition of companions. These NPC characters which accompany the player through most of the game provide support to those who need it without forcing them to request help from other players. Companions are an integral part of the crafting game as all crafting and some resource gathering is actually done by the companions themselves allowing those who wish to be more social and less lethal to still participate in this cutting into game.

Some good points there, but there’s even more aspects given the nod of approval:

SWTOR also features many accessibility options such as full subtitles, queue-able actions, multiple action bars, area looting, auto looting, and built-in mouse sensitivity. Other built-in features such as automatically turning to face the monster you are killing, mini map colors being colorblind friendly, full subtitles, and the ability to control the entire game from the keyboard or with the mouse, only increase the reasons to herald this game as a success for game accessibility.

It’s not all champagne and roses, with AbleGamers giving some tips for further improvement, including  close captioning and adding the ability to modify the UI or the size of text displayed. Overall though, they’re mightily impressed and Bioware should be feeling pretty proud of the wraps their getting from a sometimes overlooked quarter.

We’d love to hear from any disabled gamers playing SWTOR on their thoughts of the game – are you finding it a superior experience accessibility-wise compared to other games?