How the PS5’s DualSense controller is failing disabled players
Enlarge / The DualSense Edge offers some nice improvements for pro PS5 gamers, but not the additional accessibility gamers with disabilities need.
On opening night of August's Gamescom conference, PlayStation announced its new PlayStation 5 controller, the DualSense Edge. With the new iteration, players can remap inputs and save them as custom profiles and even replace physical buttons and add levers to the controller's backside.
Though these changes offer a certain level of accessibility, neither the announcement nor the accompanying blog post suggests this was deliberate. Rather, the DualSense Edge is a high-performance, ultra customizable" gamepad ostensibly aimed at competitive gamers. At its heart, the Edge remains the same-old DualSense, and, as such, its accessibility improvements feel incidental rather than intended.
That has been something of a disappointment to gaming accessibility advocates and players who rely on non-standard controls. In the wake of Microsoft's success with the Xbox Adaptive Controller, Sony's lack of similarly accessible control options for the PlayStation 5 is starting to stick out like a sore thumb(stick).