Concepts for Color-Blind options

[DrakeyC]

I lurk on the forums, but I've seen discussions and mods to help colorblind players. Now, I am not colorblind myself, but I think accessibility is important, so I wanted to brainstorm some ways the game could be more friendly to colorblind players with more visual shorthands, and should not be difficult to implement from a technical standpoint so players who don't want these features can turn them off.

Inserters and Belts

In the field, give inserters a black colored band (I believe this would make it stand out visually against the colored areas) around the two segments of the moving arm, in the shape of an ^ or >, to indicate the inserter's speed in the same manner as belts and underground belts. Burner inserters have none, normal inserters have one, fast inserters have two, and stack inserters have three. For the upcoming bulk inserters, have one and two bands but at increased thickness.

In the menu, differentiate between them by small sideways > signs in the upper-right corner of the icon, once again none for burner, one for normal, two for fast, three for stack, and one and two thicker symbols for incoming bulk inserters. For long-handled inserters, use a -->, easy shorthand to indicate range.

I'd also suggest this system be applied to belts - yellow belts have more frequent yellow arrows on them, reds have them a bit more infrequent, and blue have them least frequent. In the menu icons, yellow belts have one arrow, red have two, blue have three. Undergrounds already have > markings on them, just recolor them a little to pop out more and once again go one-two-three. For splitters, there's a little less real estate for color, but it could still work - a single vertical stripe down the middle of the inserter's V shape for yellow, two on either side for red, three for blue. In the menu once again use arrows in the upper-right corners.

Products

For circuitboards, currently there are three wires running along their length, and that lends itself easily to a visual indicator - green circuits have a single wire, red circuits have two, and blue have three.

Modules, change the formation of the lights on them - left-right diagonal for efficiency, right-left diagonal for speed, clustered in the middle for productivity.

Explosives and cliff explosives, change one to have a single white band around them. Alternatively could just flip or rotate one of them, as-is I wouldn't mind a slightly different icon anyway.

Science packs - different shapes of flasks could be used, if there is a willingness for new models. There's the current one, simple vials/tubes, rounded bottoms, etc. Alternatively and more simply, you could stamp a letter on them for their type - A, L, M, C, P, U, S. This could also be applied to logistics chests - A, B, P, R, S.

Firearm magazines, once again the number of stripes on the side of the magazine - one for tier one, two for armor-piercing, three for uranium. Shells already have color differences one could see, as do rockets, they could simply be made to cover more of the projectile. I'd also make explosive shells have more of a rounded head to make them easier to tell apart from piercing shells; rockets have a smaller profile and fins, so I don't think confusion would arise. Poison and slowdown capsules, I'd make slowdown dark red instead of yellow for better contrast.

Fluids

I think this is the big one that would be a pain, since there's so many fluids in the game. For menu icons, I'd keep the droplet icon already in use for crude oil, use two smaller droplets side-by-side for heavy oil, and three smaller droplets in a triangle (like the heavy-to-light cracking icon) for light oil; the heavy-to-light cracking icon could be changed to two drops with an arrow pointing between them, as this is the only fluid-to-fluid icon one has to worry about keeping track of. For water, a faucet icon with a droplet coming out of it. Finally for lubrication, a droplet being dripped between two gears, kinda similar to the light oil-to-petroilium gas icon, but the gears should make it different enough. Alternative, could be a droplet dripping down from between two gears.

Then comes showing these differences in pipes and barrels in the field. Once again could stamp letters on barrels and pipes - C, H, Li, P, W, S, Lu. A bit more complex, but, barrels could have different lines along the side - one for crude oil, two for heavy oil, three for light oil, four for petroleum. Water could be zero lines, and sulfuric acid, and lubricant could be horizontal lines, one and two.

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I'm very open to feedback, especially from players who are colorblind, on what people think of these ideas and if they have their own.

[Altainia]

I'd always thought that iconography could be added for logistic chests to help both colorblind individuals as well as just to better communicate what they do. I've attached an example of something that has been kicking inside my head for a while.

[mmmPI]

Science packs - different shapes of flasks could be used, if there is a willingness for new models. There's the current one, simple vials/tubes, rounded bottoms, etc. Alternatively and more simply, you could stamp a letter on them for their type - A, L, M, C, P, U, S. This could also be applied to logistics chests - A, B, P, R, S.

The shape different shape of flasks i've seen a mod do : https://mods.factorio.com/mod/cb-science

Different things are used to represent science by other mods , like datacards which as said for circuits have a straight square face like a paper sheet, good for placing a symbol like a gear, droplet, letter ... the risk being that at small scale it's difficult to differentiate without their colors which is the whole point.

I think i'm in the norm regarding seeing colors but i have been playing with mods that adds dozens of fluids, and there was just not enough colors, some ended up being almost the same, if they get mixed up you have to use filter inserters or splitters to have your factory sort them out, not you as a player because you can't ,visually, when they are "on the field" / "on belts".
It is also to some extend the case for ressources that should look very similar, like if you play with "coal", "crushed coal", "charcoal"," coal pellet", "ashes", "refined coal", "coal powder", "carbon", you end up necessarily with very similar looking icons when they are on belts, and it's not so easy to make sure which one is which and they are all the same color, it doesn't prevent playing but it sure does create some headaches and force to play differently, "around" those.

I read your ideas as "how to make good icons", what works and what doesn't, that could be used as guildelines for modders too.

I've attached an example of something that has been kicking inside my head for a while.

It make sense when you think of it, i like it !

maybe it would be easier to understand if it was a "minus" (" - ") inside the purple chest , and a "plus" (" + ") inside the blue, or maybe a dot and an arrow pointing right on the purple and blue,inside the U, so that one time it show " things goes out" and the other "thing goes in" but it would break the mirror between red and blue, maybe just an arrow point right instead of the middle dot on the active provider, at this point i'm not sure it would have made it easier for me , or in general though

I think it would be funny to show that picture to someone who doesn't play factorio, and ask them what they think the chest of different colors do based on the symbol. Maybe it would be necessary to add some context, like it's in a warehouse or factory, and robots or aliens are moving items. I think it would be a nice puzzle ? riddle ? not sure the exact word but that's why i put the explanation in spoiler, you can make an easier version of "crack the alien code" where you tell beforehand that there exist 5 chests and what they do, and see if people can figure out and associate the function to the symbol, i think they would. I think such symbols could be an overlay from the alt view visible over the whole chest or as a setting or for minimalist /symbolic factorio.

[Altainia]

So something like this?

[DrakeyC]

I love those logistic icons, easy to identify function but still visually interesting.

[mmmPI]

So something like this?

This version i think is more explicit, i would have found faster what it means, but not sure it's better as an icon, not sure how necessary it is that the meaning is "always obvious" instead of something more minimalist like the other version. I like them both anyway

[landmine752]

This is a topic I've been trying to address in an unannounced mod I'm working on. Factorio relies a lot on recolouring, and I have put a significant amount of effort into trying to address this. In doing so, I believe it will help with quickly identifying and understanding an object, not just with accessibility.

You may not realize just how many recolours there are. Inserters, logistics chests, even the ores are recolours. If everything were black and white, you would need the text descriptions when hovering over something.

In the interest in improving the accessibility of Factorio - in the event this is seen by a dev - here is a comprehensive list of the recolours and my approach on a solution. Some are easy fixes, others more complex. My work is not perfect, but perhaps it can help find substitutions for the recolours.

My Solutions+Images

My Approach
For each variation of an object, two factors should be used in making it unique. This can include colour, shape, size, pattern/texture, quantity or other visual element. I use colour and shape often, or colour and size. Using two factors helps make the differences more apparent when seeing the objects at different sizes, resolutions, in different places or with colourblindness.

Ideally, the art should reflect the object. For instance, different circuit boards should still be circuit boards; different fluids should tell you "this is water" or "this is heavy/light oil"... etc. This is important because you may be able to see two explosives, explosive A and explosive B, but one only destroys cliffs. A well designed icon would say "this destroys cliffs". Not all of my solutions address this well, like capsules and explosives, though I hope to revisit them in the future.

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Belts/Splitters/Underground Belts
The only one I have tackled here are splitters, though I want to revisit the belts/undergrounds at some point in the future. For the splitters, I've changed their shape, using a two-tier plate design on the fast variant, and included a pattern and larger sized plates on the express one. I'm thinking of the same approach for the underground belts.


Inserters *Not pictured*
Another entity I wish to revisit - my current plans are adding little doodads to the inserter base. This is because the arms get stretched/distorted depending on where they are facing. The burner one may have an exhaust port, fast may have speed flames, and the stack ones may be more shovel-esque.


Logistic Chests
Altainia already brought up the idea of using icons to identify the different chests. That's exactly what I have done. The trick was finding icons that could make sense to even unfamiliar players.


Cables
Did you realize there are 3 different kinds of cables? Copper, red, and green. Copper is more dense than the others, red is curled clockwise with a visible 'R', and green is curled counter-clockwise with a visible 'G'. This need a bit more polish, but for my mod it works. Coming to Factorio, one could look at a spool of copper wire or other depiction of wire, though I'm not too sure on how to distinguish red and green wire.


Blueprints
Blueprint/deconstruction/upgrade planners are just different colours of the same icon. My solution may not be great, but I've flipped the deconstruction planner and added icons to the upgrade planner.


Modules
We have 3 different kinds of modules each with 3 variants. I've added icons on each type to help you quickly identify which type it is (speed, efficiency, productivity). I think this approach could also work for Factorio. My only concern would be how legible would they be when placed on beacons? They are much smaller on a beacon; I've yet to tackle this issue.
For the different levels of modules, I made the bulbs removable, meaning they are not present in lower leveled modules - this adds a shape difference, not just a lit/unlit light.

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Resources/Ores
I didn't realize how big of an issue resources were until a couple weeks ago. Coal, stone, copper, and iron are recoloured rocks. The rocks do change shape and colour, but they are so small and so numerous that the different shapes just merge into a general pile of rock. What I've tried is giving copper/iron larger chunks of ore, and had coal/stone be smaller pieces overall. This helps them look a bit different on average.
An alternative I've thought about is more akin to uranium's unique shape: it is large shards, often triangular in shape, so it is very distinct. My thinking is trying squared rocks and rounded rocks, maybe in addition to the large/small rock size.

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Fluids
The water droplet is used for each one. My solution was to add some internal pattern to them, helping distinguish which they are (heavy vs light, or lubricant vs water). I took a very direct approach; changing the droplet shape, or moving away from it for a couple may be a better solution.


Iron/Copper Plate
The game already shows the two at different angles, I just took that further.


Barrels *Not pictured*
The way barrels work in-game is that they are simply recoloured. It made them very simple to reskin, but it doesn't help with accessibility. My solution, if it were easier, is probably just add a pattern over each one or change the style of the barrel. Icons would not be my approach as they do have too much similarities at that point.


Circuits
My solution was to simply change the style of chip in addition to colour. Advanced circuits are memory/RAM sticks, and processor units are processor CPUs. This was really straightforward for me, actually.


Rocket/Nuclear Fuel
My mod lends itself to Jerry/fuel cans. This gave me a large space to include icons on the side. For Factorio, changing the shape is likely a good way to go, maybe making nuclear fuel more slim/streamlined and rocket fuel more bulky.


Uranium 238/235 *Not pictured*
Not my best solution, I will admit. Uranium 238 has a bit of a different shape and is given a tilt. Might revisit it one day. I think a bigger difference in shape, or maybe just break 238 into 2 smaller rocks, would be the best solution.


Uranium Fuel Cells *Not pictured*
I will need to address these at some point, maybe including some lights or flashy tech on the unused fuel cells.


Science Packs
For my mod, I made drink can science packs. I was also thinking sports drink bottles, but the icons can be pretty small in some cases so I kept them simple in shape. Plus, cans have a large enough space to include the drink flavour. Disclaimer: do not drink science packs, regardless of their flavour.
The science pack shape mod was mentioned, and that is certainly one option. It might get more difficult with more science packs coming in the DLC, so it might require different styles of beakers, or unique science pack item (e.g. pill, square container, or dust in a jar) that might make more sense for the science from a certain planet.

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Ammo
Projectile ammo has a unique colour pattern on each version, and they increase in size each step. For shotgun shells they increase in number. The cannon shells vary in shape and contain unique patterns, and I did the same with rockets. For these, I did not consider visually connecting the mechanic to the icon. It would be very difficult considering most are damage increases. Instead, I increased the size/complexity of better ammo.


Grenades
What is a cluster grenade if not a bunch of smaller grenades duck-taped together? Since Factorio is a little less comical in nature, I would recommend a different style/shape of grenade.


Poison/Slowdown Capsules
Again, not my best solution as I am also not sold on this as the final direction. I used shape to distinguish the two capsules, plus different styles of lighting to help with the colour change. This gives them unique shapes but doesn't help identify which is which. To revisit it, I might go harder one one being clouds, the other being goo.


Explosives *Not pictured*
I switched the direction the cords on the explosives were facing - towards the player or away. To revisit the idea, I'd also rotate one 90 degrees. What would be best is finding a way to illustrate "this only destroys cliffs".


Equipment
Generally, I added more of the thing. Two lightning bolts on the energy shield mk2, a third bot in the roboport backpack mk2. For Factorio, I think the best approach is just adding more elements or doodads to the upgraded equipment. The personal roboport mk2 already does this, though I think it needs more.


A couple resources I used
https://davidmathlogic.com/colorblind/# ... -%23D51729 - good tool for creating a colour palette.
https://www.color-blindness.com/coblis- ... simulator/ - A quick way to upload an image and simulate a large variety of color vision deficiencies.