Access-Ability Summer Showcase 2025 Roundup

Warning: Some games discussed in this article focus on topics that may be disturbing. Reader discretion is advised.

It’s no secret that the core of Phenixx Gaming’s mission statement is to highlight the importance of making games as accessible to as many players as possible. As a disabled gamer myself, I’m always happy to bring attention to efforts to expand the accessibility of games to everyone who might want to play them. That’s why I volunteered to write up a summary of every game shown at 2025’s Access-Ability Summer Showcase. Nearly all the games in question have demos available on Steam, which you can find here. That’s enough introductory rambling from me, so let’s begin the showcase roundup!

First up was ChromaGun 2: Dye Hard, coming to us from Pixel Maniacs. ChromaGun 2 was described as “a first-person puzzle shooter where color is the key to solving intricate challenges. [It’s] like Portal 2, but instead of portals, you control droids.” To help colorblind players and those with similar issues, ChromaGun 2’s Colorblind Mode ensures that all colors are marked with unique symbols. These symbols are merged in cases of mixed colors. ChromaGun 2: Dye Hard has a playable demo available now on Steam, though its release window is currently a rather vague “2025” at the time of writing.

Following that was Spray Paint Simulator, from developer North Star Video Games and publisher Whitethorn Games. Spray Paint Simulator looks strikingly similar to PowerWash Simulator, except you’re painting objects instead of cleaning them. You’ll have to prepare by, say, covering windows before you start painting. However, there’s an option to have Spray Paint Simulator do all that for you if you wish. Painting jobs have no time limits, and you don’t have to finish any jobs in one sitting. Spray Paint Simulator is out now on PC, Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 4 and 5, and it’ll launch on Nintendo Switch on June 19th, 2025.

Next was a segment highlighting some standout entries from the most recent “Games for Blind Gamers Game Jam.” As the name suggests, this is a relatively frequent event that encourages game developers of all skill and ability levels to spend a few days creating a game that’s accessible to players with limited or no eyesight. Some of the games highlighted were as follows: The Unseen Awakening, a party-based RPG where you play as a healer, Barista, a cozy game where you run a coffee shop, and Necromancer Nonsense, a real-time strategy game where you raise undead soldiers to protect your base and destroy your enemies.

That was followed by two games that were developed and published by DarZal Games, namely Quest Giver and Six-Sided Stories. In Quest Giver, you play as an NPC giving out quests to heroes. You select appropriate quests for each of the heroes in your roster to help them level up and grow stronger. You’ll need to carefully consider which quests you assign to which heroes, though: Your manager is looking for any excuse to fire you, and the heroes are impatient towards a lowly NPC such as yourself. Your choices will determine whether the ending you get is good or, shall we say, significantly less so.

Six Sided Stories was described as “like a jigsaw puzzle, but instead of placing each piece, you flip and color them correctly. Each puzzle image leads into the next one, following the adventures of a calico cat who meets new friends.” Six-Sided Stories contains no text whatsoever. There are no time limits or failure states, and you have two ways of getting hints when you need them. Both Quest Giver and Six Sided Stories are out now on Steam for $4.99 USD each, though only the latter currently has a demo you can try first.

That brings us to Soulblaze, developed and published by Sword & Quill. Soulblaze is “a creature-collecting Rogue-lite in which you capture and train animals to defeat the boss of each region.” Think Pokémon, but with combat that heavily revolves around the outcomes of dice rolls. In terms of accessibility options, Soulblaze features options like text-to-speech narration and audio descriptions, difficulty customizations, a dyslexia-friendly font, unique icons that pair with all important information conveyed by colors, and more. Soulblaze has a playable demo on Steam, but there’s nothing beyond the frustratingly vague phrase “coming soon” in terms of a full release window.

Up next was the first game that prompted me to include the content warning at the top of this article. Wednesdays, published by ARTE France, is “a hope-filled narrative game about growing up after childhood sexual abuse.” Wednesdays is played in two alternating phases: one is “a simplistic theme park management game,” while the other plays “like a visual novel or interactive comic.” Wednesdays features a myriad of accessibility options such as easily-readable fonts and accommodations for differing degrees of colorblindness. Wednesdays requires “no speed, no precision, [and] no complex sequences of actions.” Wednesdays is available now on Steam, accompanied by a playable demo.

Then we have Heartspell: Horizon Academy, coming to us from Dire Kitten Games. Heartspell: Horizon Academy is “a puzzle-based dating sim with heartwarming stories and 11 lovable characters. The branching narrative gives players choices at every turn, with romantic and friendship paths for every character.” The puzzles in Heartspell are intended to be challenging, but they have no time pressure. You can always adjust the puzzles’ difficulty or even turn them off entirely. There are also multiple dyslexia-friendly fonts and an arachnophobia mode. Heartspell has a demo available on Steam and is currently slated to release sometime in “Fall 2025.”

The next highlighted game was Blindcoco Studios’ Gales of Nayeli, a “narrative-driven strategy RPG” that was “built from the ground up with lack of color vision in mind.” Accessibility options include making faction indicators more visible to help differentiate friends from foes during battles and reducing the intensity of on-hit visual effects. Gales of Nayeli also features an optional function it calls “ideal growth mode,” which will ensure that player characters “always grow to their maximum potential” without players having to micromanage lots of details with every level-up. Gales of Nayeli is planned to release on Steam on June 23rd, 2025.

Moving on, we’ve got Sunlight from Krillbite Studio. Sunlight has been available in full on Steam since January 14th, 2021. However, Sunlight was recently updated to add multiple new accessibility options on top of those it already had. Sunlight is one of three games in this showcase that’s classified as “aiming for playability by blind players based on audio cues.” As such, full audio descriptions and support for text-to-speech systems were recently added to Sunlight to supplement its existing subtitles and audio cues. Sunlight is described as “a calm experience with no fail state, no rush, and no pressure to complete it.”

Next up is Cairn, developed and published by The Game Bakers. Cairn is a so-called “survival-climber where you choose your own path and your own difficulty as you overcome a mountain. You need to balance your stamina and your position on the rock face to climb higher.” Cairn’s newest accessibility option is the ability to rewind and undo any action in the game, including falling off the mountain. You can also disable all mini-games that require quick reactions. Cairn has a demo on Steam and PlayStation 5 now. It’s slated to launch on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S on November 5th, 2025.

Then came David Stark’s Airships: Lost Flotilla. Airships is “a steampunk bullet hell game where you fight your way through waves of enemies like robot wasps and dragons.” Airships is designed to be fully playable with only a mouse, only a keyboard, only a gamepad, or any combination of these. When playing with a keyboard, you can switch between tank controls and directional controls for most playable ships. Mouse-only players can use a setting that has their ship always follow their mouse cursor. Airships: Lost Flotilla has plenty more accessibility options than just those, and it’s available now on Steam.

Let’s “roll” right along to Rollick N’ Roll, developed and published by Crayonix Games. Rollick N’ Roll is “a casual puzzle experience inspired by classic marble run play sets.” Players can control elements of each track to help guide toy vehicles to their goal. Obstacles on each track are distinguished by contrasting colors and unique shapes. Rollick N’ Roll supports touch input, mouse-only, keyboard-only, and gamepad-only controls, along with any combination of these. Rollick N’ Roll has a demo available on Steam, but its release date is still “to be announced” at the time of this article’s publication.

Next up, we’ve got a returning title from last year’s Access-Ability Summer Showcase. Spilt Milk Studios’ Trash Goblin released out of Steam Early Access on May 28th, 2025. Trash Goblin has already been lauded for its existing array of accessibility options, but more accessibility features were added in a recent update. In Trash Goblin, you clean and sell various trinkets to interested customers. Many of Trash Goblin’s accessibility options focus on making these core gameplay aspects playable for everyone. Trash Goblin has no fail states, time pressures, or skill gates, and all its core gameplay can be controlled with virtually any input method you prefer.

Next up is Half Sunk Games’ Blow-Up: Avenge Humanity. It’s a “fast-paced, first-person rhythm shooter.” To make its gameplay more accessible, players can do things like putting outlines of different colors and thicknesses around enemies, desaturating the background, and adjusting the levels of screen shake and the field of view. Based on what I’ve seen of Blow-Up so far, though, it might need more options added to be less overwhelming for players with photosensitivity issues like myself. Blow-Up: Avenge Humanity has a demo on Steam, but the closest we’ve currently got to a release window is listed as “coming soon.”

Next is Intrapology, which is a “narrative driven, queer indie game that’s performed by real actors online.” Because its gameplay is performed in real-time online, Intrapology isn’t available to own on any platforms such as Steam. The only way to play it is to register online to attend a showing, which you can do here. Intrapology is “all about alien anthropologists in a multiverse that faces a cataclysmic breakdown in the nature of reality. The audience collectively shapes the story through a web app that looks like the main character’s janky computer desktop.” Despite efforts to maximize accessibility, Intrapology poses a photosensitivity risk in some shows.

Next up is another game designed to be completely playable without sighted assistance. Bits & Bops is a rhythm game developed and published by Tempo Lab Games. I wasn’t previously aware of any rhythm games designed to be accessible to players with sight issues, which is why I’m certainly glad to see Bits & Bops making a name for itself in that underserved niche. Bits & Bops features a “collection of original rhythm mini-games” that are made more accessible via text-to-speech narration and audio descriptions, which provide context to each mini-game. Bits & Bops has a demo on Steam and is currently slated to release sometime in “Q3 2025.”

Lastly, we’ve got the other game that prompted me to include that content warning. Coming Home, developed and published by QUDICAL, is a “retro slasher horror game with a focus on home defense.” You can view your home’s security cameras to detect where any intruders might be, and you have a gun to defend yourself if any enemies reach you. This looks a lot like a more advanced Five Nights at Freddy’s, except you’re defending yourself against murderous clowns and can rely on more to protect yourself than just doors that somehow need electricity to remain closed. Coming Home is scheduled to release in 2026.

That’s all the games covered in this year’s showcase, but there’s one more thing I want to cover. Right before the trailer for Coming Home, the Access-Ability Summer Showcase organizer, Laura Kate Dale, popped in to announce that the first-ever Access-Ability Winter Showcase is planned to air later this year. Assuming nothing changes, the Access-Ability Winter Showcase will air on Thursday, December 11th, 2025 at 4 PM U.K. Time/11 AM Eastern Time/8 AM Pacific Time. This is a “test run” intended to gauge the viability of putting on the show twice a year rather than just once.