Is it possible to switch off screen shake?

[Psy-Q]

I see a lot of screen shake in the trailer, is there an option to switch this off?

[orangepascal]

no, there's no setting to turn it off

but also, it's a trailer.. it highlights certain things, usually the action packed events of a game, and those often contain screen-shake, but that's obviously a lot more than you'd encounter during a normal play through.

[Psy-Q]

I watched some gameplay videos now and it seems like there is even shake every time you land a jump, so just watching the let's play already gave me massive nausea :)

[orangepascal]

then better skip this game :)

[Psy-Q]

Yeah, I'm afraid that's true, it looked very interesting in the let's plays (what I could see of them).

I can play bullet hell shooters and everything just fine, but screen shake will kill it. Maybe you'll consider an option for your next game if that's an action game as well?

Some devs have added options like that to their games (e.g. in NeuroVoider, Celeste, Owlboy, RIVE, Nuclear Throne, Enter The Gungeon, Tesla vs. Lovecraft...) so it'd be in great company :)

[orangepascal]

Just out of curiosity, what's the problem with screen shake? You get nauseated or something?

[Psy-Q]

Yes, for me it's strong nausea that continues minutes or hours after stopping to play, but not all people react the same, for some it's just unpleasant to play but stops immediately after.

I suspect it's similar to people with photosensitivity but who aren't epileptic. Some games now have options to switch screen flashing off (and even Nintendo removed screen flashing from Donkey Kong Country in the SNES Mini rerelease).

Haven't found a pattern yet but for those I talked to it's usually only in 2D games. I suspect it's about having the viewport shift without any input from the player. So shaking objects are fine, but not shaking screens.

Also some can't tolerate when the viewport has inertia and continues to move a little forward even when the player stops. I should make a big support group so we can find common patterns.

[orangepascal]

so.. dude, that's just something I never thought about!
I'll think about this when doing another game, as cool as screenshake is to me, I don't want people that could otherwise enjoy my game, not play it because of such a silly feature.

I also just did some work on Meganoid, and uploaded a new version with an option to disable Screenshake from the menu.. just in case you are still interested in playing the game, it can now be disabled.

Might just dive into some of my other games and do it there also :)

[Psy-Q]

What, really? That's fantastic! I'm absolutely interested! I don't know how many people are affected by the issue but I know it's at least enough that some games include the option (and obviously the number has just increased by one) :)

Thanks a ton! For me the problem started from an otherwise "harmless" eye infection, by the way, so it can happen to anyone at any time in their lives. One eye's optic nerve doesn't transmit quite as fast as the other, and that's all it took.

Thanks again, I vowed not to buy any new games this year because of the immense backlog, but I'm sneaking in an exception.

[orangepascal]

enjoy! and thanks for opening my eyes on this ;) I updated two of my other games: Ashworld and Space Grunts, and my new game also has a feature to turn it off, it's relatively simple to add, but I just never took the question/complaint serious..

[Psy-Q]

Aw man, Space Grunts has been on my radar for months or years. Gonna check it out more closely immediately, thanks!