Microsoft is the empowerment brand. For years, we’ve been championing accessibility and inclusion in tech. From inspiring young girls to stay in STEM, to developing technology to aid those with dyslexia, visual and audio impairment, this is a territory that the brand has been tremendously invested in as part of its core mission to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more.

However, the video game industry has long ignored players with disabilities. As a result, gamers with disabilities would either hack together hodgepodge tools and homemade controllers or had to spend a lot of money on a custom controller just to be able to play. For most, gaming was impossible. As the brand committed to empowering everyone, Microsoft designed the first controller for gamers with limited mobility that enhances their gaming experience and empowers them to compete in new ways.

With the launch of the Xbox Adaptive Controller, Microsoft challenged the gaming industry and put accessibility at the forefront of product design. This is the story of how Microsoft’s smallest product launch of the year made the biggest impact on the world.

We wanted to shine a light on the challenges that people with disabilities face and, through the stories of real-life gamers, illustrate the power of accessible technology to level the playing field and help people achieve more. The campaign was designed to raise awareness of the Adaptive Controller and inspire more inclusive design in the world, which is why the target audience included everyone, not just the 33 million people living with disabilities. To reach a massive audience, we assembled a cast of real gamers with disabilities, a group of kids who are rarely shown in mass media, and shared their stories on Super Bowl Sunday, a day when everyone is intensely focused on the idea of play and winning, to convey a different message about what it means to win: When everybody plays, we all win.

The campaign didn’t end with the game. We made packaging, instruction manuals, and eSports gaming more inclusive too. In the end, “Changing the Game” didn’t just change the way gamers with disabilities played, it changed the entire gaming industry, with major competitors like Google enabling their platforms to be compatible with the Adaptive Controller.

Microsoft - Changing The Game

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