This is the first time I've seen this mentioned, so thank you. I've been thinking about buying a PS4 just for this game, so that's a major bummer. I hope there's a patch in the future for some kind of visual indicator or subtitle to make it a bit easier.
Imagine if you paid for a book and there were appendices about characters or something extra, but written in a language you didn't know. It would kind of suck.
Edit: As a side note, these comments seem to be the internet equivalent of:
A: =~#$())##~
B: Sorry, what was that? I couldn't hear you.
A: Nevermind, it's not important.
Which I think most people would agree is incredibly rude and dismissive.
(You have to play the game to get why he can't give hints)
If you don't already know about it, you may want to check out the book Finnegan's Wake :)
Joking aside, I think you're right that there should be some kind of notice somewhere, in-game or out (even on the Steam page) that indicates that some parts of the game are difficult or inaccessible for players with a degree of hearing loss.
Even better might be to have an option in the game that turns on an additional visual cue that could augment whatever the original audio cue was. Actually designing it to make sense in the same way would of course be difficult, but I don't doubt that there are enough players that would appreciate that option.
You don't need to complete all the puzzles to finish the game. A small minority rely on hearing.
(I agree it sucks... trying to be optimistic; not trying to argue with you :) )
I think you'll still be able to enjoy the game.
On the other hand, there are audio logs scattered about which you might prefer to be able to hear. They don't tell a story though; it's more of an examination of things Jonathan Blow feels are important. I think that's a cool part of the game, even though I suspect that I disagree with him entirely.
The elephant in the room is obviously that there's no accommodation for the blind at all.
So you can definitely finish the game without sound, but if you're a perfectionist aiming for 100% you'll need to resort to outside help, which does suck.
The puzzles don't even have a visual cue to let you know audio is important, so if you're not expecting it these puzzles just seem unsolvable.
This and no colour blind support are probably the two biggest criticisms I have of the game.
I must admit that I also sometimes fail to remember making the software I create accessible to deaf or blind persons. It's never because I don't want to, it's just that there's often nobody on the team that has this particular problem and so it is forgotten.