Accessibility and controls
Nature of Dread advertises full controller support with DualShock and DualSense profiles, plus adjustable text size, camera comfort, custom volume, subtitle options, adjustable difficulty, a keyboard-only option, a mouse-only option and a playable-without-timed-input tag.
For an unreleased indie horror game, Nature of Dread has an unusually complete feature list. Steam exposes sixteen separate flags on the listing, and eight of them are accessibility or input options rather than gameplay features. That is worth reading closely before release, because it tells you what the studio has already decided to support.
Input and controller support
| Feature | What it means for you |
|---|---|
| Full controller support | The game is designed to be played start to finish on a gamepad, not merely to detect one |
| DualShock controller support | PlayStation 4 controller layout and button prompts are supported |
| DualSense controller support | PlayStation 5 controller layout and button prompts are supported |
| Keyboard only option | Every action is bound to keyboard keys, so you can play without a mouse |
| Mouse only option | Every action is available on mouse input, so you can play without a keyboard |
"Full controller support" is a specific Steam category, distinct from partial support. Partial support means the game runs with a pad but expects a mouse for menus; full support means the whole experience, menus included, is navigable with the controller. For a first-person game with inventory and prompts, that difference is the one that matters.
The keyboard-only and mouse-only flags are rarer than they look. They usually indicate that the studio has tested single-input play rather than just assuming two-handed use, which matters for players with limited mobility in one hand.
Accessibility flags
| Flag | What it controls |
|---|---|
| Adjustable text size | In-game text, including subtitles and interface text, can be rescaled |
| Subtitle options | Subtitles can be configured — typically size, background and whether they are on at all |
| Camera comfort | Options that reduce camera motion, which in first-person games means head bob, motion blur, camera shake and field of view |
| Adjustable difficulty | Difficulty can be changed, rather than fixed at the start |
| Custom volume controls | Individual audio channels can be balanced separately |
| Playable without timed input | The game can be completed without input-timing challenges, which usually means quick-time events are optional, skippable or absent |
Three of those deserve emphasis for a horror game specifically.
Camera comfort is the flag that decides whether first-person horror is playable for a lot of people. Camera motion in a dark corridor is the most common cause of nausea in the genre, and a studio that lists it has at least built the options.
Adjustable text size combined with subtitle options covers the two failure modes of subtitled horror: text too small to read at a distance, and text that disappears against a dark background.
Playable without timed input is the strongest accessibility claim on the list. In horror games, timed input usually means a prompt you must hit while something is coming at you — the exact moment a player with motor or processing difficulties is excluded. A studio that tags this has either removed those sequences or made them optional.
Sound, achievements and family sharing
The remaining categories describe the shape of the product: single-player (no co-op, no online requirement implied), Steam Achievements, Family Sharing, and stereo and surround sound — both mixes supported, which matters in a game that sells silence and directional cues.
Difficulty, and why the flag matters here
Adjustable difficulty appears in a game whose marketing emphasises adaptive enemies and scarce resources. Those two things usually fight each other: adaptive AI is designed for one tuning point, and difficulty sliders often just change damage numbers.
What the flag guarantees is that you are not locked into a tuning you cannot handle, which for a horror game with combat is a real consideration rather than a courtesy. What it does not tell you is whether difficulty changes enemy behaviour or only damage values — that detail will only be visible in the released build.
What is not listed
Three accessibility features common in modern releases do not appear on the listing, and their absence is worth knowing before you plan around them: no colour-blind or colour-customisation flag, no screen-reader or audio-description flag, and no subtitle list beyond the twelve supported languages.
None of those mean the features are absent — Steam's categories are opt-in and plenty of games ship options they do not tag — but nothing on the store page promises them.
Practical setup advice
Until the game ships, the sensible plan is to decide your input method in advance and check the two comfort flags first thing.
- Pick your input before your first launch. Controller support is fully flagged, which suggests the pad layout is a first-class configuration rather than an afterthought.
- Open the camera comfort settings before you start, not after you feel unwell. Head bob and motion blur are the two settings to look for.
- Set subtitle size and background early. A horror game that expects you to read during movement is unreadable at default size on a large monitor.
- Check the difficulty options at the first menu. If the game allows mid-run changes, you can start higher and drop if the resource economy turns punishing.
- Balance audio channels deliberately. Custom volume controls exist, and in a game built on silence you may want ambience up and music down, or the reverse.
For the hardware side of getting the game running at all, see PC system requirements. For how the combat these settings affect is meant to work, Combat and weapons.
