Rocket League adds accessibility options to prevent people having seizures

People can tweak the visual effects on the new arena Neon Fields.

Developer Psyonix has added some new features to minimise the risk of Rocket League players having seizures.

In a blog post on its site, the studio said that it was introducing a new option to the settings menu called Effect Intensity, which impacts "the intensity and motion" of visual effects in the Neon Fields arena.

This new area was introduced at the end of 2020 as part of the Rocket League Season 2 round of content. Reports followed about users suffering seizures as a result of the level's bright aesthetic.

The new options allow players to disable pulsing effects as well as flashing lights. They can also reduce or disable lights, moving effects or background visuals, in addition to being able to reduce how bright and intense background lights are.

Accessibility is a hot topic in the games industry at the moment, as is the risk of seizures in video games. Reports of Rocket League potentially triggering seizures in players came around the same that it emerged that eagerly-anticipated RPG Cyberpunk 2077 also could trigger seizures in epileptic players. This news was broken ahead of the game's release, with developer CD Projekt patching this content two days after launch.

At the time, UK charity Epilepsy Action said that it was "alarmed and saddened" by the risk posed to gamers.

Rocket League launched in the summer of 2015. Fortnite giant Epic Games snapped up developer Psyonix in May 2019, with Rocket League moving to a free-to-play business model in September 2020.