Gamers

I've unexpectedly been thrown into a gamers world.
This semester's IAM Team Class has been given the task to take this years 3G Summit's winning game "to the next level". Whatever that may mean.
So with a group where none of the majors are Game Design and none of our specializations are specific to game development, animation, programming or sound design. This is bound to be an interesting semester. (Or should i say hellish?)
From one day to another we've had to dive into the ever expanding world of game-culture. We've had to come up with narrative, character development, system platforms, audio requirements, target audience, and general game mechanics just to get started. 

What? (yea, that's how i feel)

But I guess the hardest part for me has been coming to terms with the stereotype of girl gamers, or gamers in general. It also doesn’t help that as a team we were given a clichéd game topic (environment, and corporation responsibility) – even though it’s still a very relevant subject in the real world, it hasn't made adjusting to the idea of developing a game any easier.

This was the 3G Summit's first year, the 3 G's stand for girls, gaming and gender. It included 50 high school girls from around the Chicago area, and five women game designers from around the country. Names like Mary Flanagan, Tracy Fullerton, Bill Viola were all foreign to me a couple weeks back, and now I'm coming across all kinds of projects  either by them or influenced by them.  

But all in all, i should also mention the original concept comes from a good place, and it carries a good message. Seeing and being part of girls getting involved in technology is very exciting for obvious reasons. The fact that there is just one other girl in a senior class-team of eight should tell you something about how unbalanced the technology industry is as a whole. So to have the first ever conference of its kind hosted by my college and to be able to part of it, is beyond amazing.

So! to fight the negative nancy demons in me, I've gone on a quest to look for info on this whole gaming-for-awareness idea. And not surprisingly i came across this (Ted never fails me) which led me to this and back to one of the 3G panelist. Needless to say, there's a big movement behind games that show some kind of positive aspect. Now, I'm just left with the hope that women are not the majority behind developing these type of games. But i have realized you CAN bring awareness to specific issues, and hopefully involve people in the process.

And who's to say i shouldn't consider myself a gamer? I'm pretty sure i was the only one on my block with a Nintendo Mario Brothers, battling it out with my sister to get to World 8!