About
The Bizhawk Pokémon Emerald Access script is a project aiming to give a screen reader access to the game "Pokémon Emerald" much like the Pokecrystal access project or the Pokémon Access project. This script is released in a rather rough shape, please don't expect a perfect experience.
Requirements
This script needs the following softwares installed beforehand to work :
- Windows 10 or above - This version of windows is required for the Bizhawk emulator.
- NVDA - This script will use NVDA as the screen reader.
- Bizhawk 2.8 - This script is intended to work on version 2.8 of Bizhawk, it may or may not work on a newer version, depending on it's LUA scripting compatibility.
Installation
Make sure you can meet the requirements above before proceeding with the installation of this script. Here is a link to a page explaining how to install the Bizhawk emulator : https://tasvideos.org/BizHawk/ReleaseHistory. Be careful to not forget to install it's prereq installer.
- Download the script in the Download section according to you prefered language.
- Decompress the downloaded archive at the base of your Bizhawk folder.
- Launch the script by executing the installed batch file named "Bizhawk Pokemon Emerald Access *your language*.bat".
Usage
The following keys are the default game controls from the GBA emulator :
- Up : Up arrow
- Down : Down arrow
- Left : Left arrow
- Right : Right arrow
- Start : Enter
- Select : Space
- B : Z key
- A : X key
- L : W key
- R : E key
The following keys are specific to the script and are meant to help with the screen reading :
- Y : Read the player's current coordinates.
- T : Read windows text mode : Pause the game and give you the ability to read text entries from the different displayed windows. Use the UP and DOWN buttons to change the window. Press T again to exit.
- L : Screen reader log mode : Pause the game and allow you to re-hear important past messages and dialogs. Use the UP and DOWN buttons to change the log entry. Press L again to exit.
- K : Read points of interest mode : Pause the game and give you the ability to hear the different entities on the present map. Use the LEFT and RIGHT button to change the entity type, UP and DOWN to move through the list. Press K again to exit.
- U : Voice the relative coordinates from the last selected item in the points of interest menu. Note that this is just a bookmark, if the entity moves, it wont be updated.
- M : Contrast view mode : Replace the game's overworld view with a synthetic and more contrasted one. Press M a second time to zoom in and a third time to turn it off.
- O : Change the coordinate reading style for the points of interest menu, relative or absolute.
These key bindings can be changed in the config file named "bizhawk/Lua/GBA/Pokemon Emerald Access/pkmgen3/AccessSettings.lua"
After having installed Bizhawk, you may want to adjust it's music and sound volume so as not to overpower NDVA's voice. Sadly, this emulator's menus aren't well accessible but you can change it's configuration in the file "config.ini" inside the Bizhawk folder. In this file, search for the "SoundVolume" (music) and "SoundVolumeRWFF" (other sounds) entries and adjust their values to the desired level.
When playing the game, the script will try to automaticaly read incoming texts and menus. Sounds will be played to give you a clue on what sort of tile you're currently standing on. For blind players, the "read points of interest mode" should be used to help with navigating and a "click" sound will play when entities enter or leave your proximity. The default dialog speed is changed by default to the fastest. Otherwise, the game is played with the same inputs as without the script running.
Download
Version 16 06 2022
Version 09 04 2022.1
Version 09 04 2022
Version 06 04 2022.1
Version 01 04 2022
Known issues
In game issues :
- Many menus aren't read properly or at all, but the essential ones are.
- I've been reported that the script will crash when an egg hatch.
- Many problems with accentuated characters.
Other issues :
- Closing the sound controller program will crash NVDA. You can let it close itself properly by closing the emulator first.
- When going out of focus from the emulator window, NVDA may sometime blocks some of your keyboard inputs when refocusing back. As a workaround, going into and out of certains of the emulator's menus can solve that problem. ("Alt+C" then two times "Enter" will do)
Version history
16 06 2022
- Added the ability to detect the warp tile in the battle pyramid when it appears.
09 04 2022.1
- Fixed a script crash when using the Italian ROM.
09 04 2022
- Added basic compatibility for the Italian ROM.
- Added the "O" key to change between absolute and relative coordinates in the points of interest menu.
06 04 2022.1
- Made grass sounds louder.
- Fixed "ghost" entities appearing in the menu list.
- Moving entities's position is now updated when using the U key.
- Added "click" sounds when entities appear and disappear to help with their detection.
- Version 06 04 2022 had the debug flag left on wich would make the game quite unplayable.
01 04 2022
- Added basic compatibility for the Spanish ROM.
- The script will go ahead even if the game hasn't been properly recognized, the script will assume it as the english version. This could help for ROM hacks or unsupported languages versions.
- The last points of interest menu mode used is restored when that menu is reopened.
- Script's menus can be closed with the A and B button too now.
31 03 2022
- Added the "Y" key to replace the automatic voicing of position while standing still.
- Added the "U" key to voice the relative position from the last selected item in the points of interest menu.
30 03 2022
- Fixed a script crash when entering a battle. (I could read feedback from the audiogames.net forum but I'm not registered there yet.)
27 03 2022
Source
Github repository
Author: n0n0ce@free.fr