"Informal estimates put the percentage of women in the industry at around 10 percent, and even then, most tend to be in jobs in customer service, marketing and quality assurance. Relatively few women work as game designers and producers, and even fewer are programmers."
At least that's the deal according to
The New York Times* in their profile of Denise Fulton who, at 34, is an executive producer at Ion Storm in Austin, Texas. You had better be nice to her, boys, as she is in charge of overseeing the next
Deus Ex game!
But Ms. Fulton is not the only rarity representing the fairer sex in the digital arena. Laura Fryer (executive producer at Microsoft for Xbox games) and Nicky Robinson (who helped program
Army Men and
Battle Tanx) are also among the very scant few.
Says Ms. Robinson about testosterone fueled upper managements at some game companies, "They all have to prove that they are tougher and more macho than the guys in the other department or at the other company."
Common sense would best describe many of the grievances these brilliant women have about a lot of the games out there--overcomplicated interfaces, overly gratuitous violence, overtly representational gratuitous violence, overtly oversexed digital representations of women.
So naturally they feel obliged to even the score. An assistant professor of computer science at Harvey Mudd College, Claremont, Ca., Dr. Elizabeth Sweedyk has received a $200,000 grant from the National Science Foundation. With it she is working on a course design for women to inspire them to create games that are, let's just say, less testosterone pumped. Says Dr. Sweedyk: "Do women not play games because the games that are out there are designed for men, or is it just that women really don't like computer games? My guess is they don't like the games that are out there."
Besides, the success of these women and the eventual gendered democratization of the games industry and gaming culture can only mean one thing: more awesome, interesting, and diverse games for everyone! And isn't that a good thing, 'guys'?
* Free registration required to read the full article.
Posted by Beiddie Rafól
Gamers, listen up: Denise Fulton is your man!
