The Guardian view on video games design: more diversity needed

Friday, 11 October 2024

The Guardian view on video games design: more diversity needed

Added: 02.01.2015 6:10 | 3 views | 0 comments

Theres a scene in the dark video game The Last of Us when a girl of 13 is stalking a deer in a snowy forest. Ellie is one of a few survivors in a post-apocalyptic, disease-ridden America, and is hunting to feed herself and an older man called Joel, who is injured. So the roles of hunter and carer are reversed Ellie is strong and playful, challenging the more typical roles of women as bystanders, or collateral, or victims. She is as capable of saving Joel as he is of saving her. Thousands of Christmas days will have been spent trying to keep the pair alive. Video games are one of the most vibrant cultural forms of the 21st century but they have an image problem. The industry is seen as a boys club, a production line of games written by young men, predominantly aimed at young men. Even though independent studios are making more diverse content than ever, gaming culture is dominated by male voices. In the UK only 14% of the UKs video game workforce is female, compared with 47...