[DoctorEldritch]

Hello Legion Gamers!

The month of Women in Gaming is two-thirds behind us, and I thought it is a good time to remember women not only as game characters but also as professionals in the gaming industry. And there are many different professionals out there, from developers and writers to voice actors and cosplayers.

To be honest, even with books like Gamer Girls: 25 Women Who Built the Video Game Industry that we talked about before, I find it difficult to name women who worked in the gaming industry on the spot when asked, I always need my notes for that. Without them, the only 2 persons I remember are Rhianna Pratchett and Ashly Burch.

Rhianna Pratchett does some story writing for the games like Overlord and the newest Tomb Raider, though some think that the quality of her work varies. Even then, I mostly know her because of her legendary father, sir Terry Pratchett, creator of the Discworld series.



And Ashly Burch I remember mostly due to the sheer volume of voice acting that she did, including such characters as Aloy from Horizon Zero Dawn or Parvati from The Outer Worlds, among many others. But it was not until I saw her playing live in The Mythic Quest series that connected the voice to the face and can now recognize her.



These are the 2 ladies I can remember on the spot. But there are, of course, many more, so I want to ask you: do you know a female professional in gaming who you'd want to share as well?

[Saka]

@DoctorEldritch A dear friend of mine is a freelancer artist making graphics for games. Here's her Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheJackyMartin

There are plenty of women working in the game industry. The problem is their work is not getting the same recognition as their male counterparts'. They also rarely are promoted to the top and even then there are severe pay gaps. As an example from the top of my head, there was a token hire from Blizzard for the co-leadershop as a result of the huge controversies following the sexual harassment accusations/suit. She resigned just a few months later because she was earning just a fraction of the male co-lead's paycheck and Activision refused to amend that.

[DoctorEldritch]

@Saka It is nice to have friends like that, what games has she drawn for?

Ah, the questionable practices of big gaming companies do not stop at gender inequality, I'm afraid. EA, for example, boasts that they fight inequality and try to promote programs that involve more women, but at the same time, just last month there was that case where EA laid off Over 200 game testers, and via the zoom call, no less, it made it into the news even. You really don't know what to think when a company fights inequality with one hand and is firing people as they did with the other...

But this brings up an interesting question: do you think it is easier for women to thrive in indie game companies that are less "corporate"?

[Saka]

@DoctorEldritch Ugh, I unfortunately forgot. She's been showing me some in the past, but it was a long time ago. I rarely talk about her work, because she's so dedicated and hard-working that it takes a good chunk of her life. I usually talk about other topics, so that she can have something else to think about.

Indie companies, unfortunately, can be about as much of sh*tshow as the corporations. The same friend once ended up being terminated after not being paid for her work, it was a rather significant amount owed. The only consolation she got is that the company ended up becoming a shipwreck.

Gaming industry is full of toxicity and employee abuse. I admit, corporations are especially prone to use the enthusiasm younger employees have for gaming to crunch them really hard. Indie companies usually have less power to do so, but the environment in them is not necessarily healthier. It's a big problem that needs to be brought to light and worked on resolution for.

[DoctorEldritch]

@Saka Oh, that's too bad, it would be interesting to know. Maybe she'd be willing to join us one of these days and share her art and experience. That company does sound bad, and it would be interesting to hear about situations like this from someone who experienced it firsthand.

With indie companies, I guess it depends a bit on the company, some of them work for equality and social responsibility, and some are more focused on the bottom line. Though it does not help that the gaming industry is so competitive these days. But at least we can and should talk about issues like these: how would you approach this problem of the environment in gaming companies? There is no easy solution.

Interestingly, I was just writing a post about a new game that just came out, Tchia. It is an interesting one, based on the folklore of a distant island, I want to check it out. But the reason why I am mentioning it here is, as I was looking into this game, I discovered that it was published by Kepler Interactive, and they boast a "unique co‑ownership model" where it is formed from seven indie game studios and they all have decision power. Maybe that is a way to go?

[Saka]

@DoctorEldritch I could talk to her about that and see if she would be interested in sharing her experiences. It would be definitely interesting to hear more about the problems in the industry from the inside.

As for the atmosphere in the gaming industry... eh, same as the harassment in gaming or gender based pay gaps, there is no simple fix. There needs to be a lot of talk about it and consumers should be encouraged to vote with their wallets. Even if they don't entirely stop buying a company's product, if for a period following after some event a significant amount of people halt doing purchases, it does send a message. Sadly, money speaks to corporations better than anything else.

Unions and courts should try to discourage the companies from bad practices too.

The co-ownership of 7 studios is an interesting ownership model. I wonder how it works in practice.

[DoctorEldritch]

@Saka It is a slippery slope with voting with wallets. Though sound enough in principle, look at what was happening during the Hogwarts Legacy launch because of Rolling's tweets... There really is no quick and easy solution, it seems...

[DoctorEldritch]

@Saka But it is through experiences like your friends that we can see the extent of the problem and may be able to resolve it better or faster, this subject is well worth talking about.

[Saka]

@DoctorEldritch Yeah, Hogwarts is too big of a franchise to notice any significant effect. There are so many people who don't know at all about the transphobic tweets of J.K. Rowling, but grew up with the books and want to play the game.

It also depends who is actually at fault there. In Hogwarts Legacy's case the potential big boycott would've only harm developers, who were trying to recover after Disney cancelled contract with them. The author of the books was already paid as far as I know.

In cases like Blizzard's sexual abuse case, enough stink was raised and multiple people cancelling their subscriptions actually sent a message. There were some changes as a result, even if mostly cosmetic.