The game industry is a hybrid of technology and creative industries. It combines creativity and technical solutions to tell stories, make an impact, and provide entertainment.

Across Europe, game design is included as part of degrees ranging from animation to management and sound design. Europe has around 5,500 game development studios (Statista 2024). In 2023, the sector employed over 114,000 people, but only 24% of the industry workforce were women (Video Games Europe 2023).

In the NuGamers project, we started studying the current situation and landscape of girls and women in gaming and gender equality in the game industry and education. As a result, we are looking for ways to create more gender-inclusive gaming education to bridge this gap.

As we gathered more information, it quickly became apparent that these challenges are not limited to the game industry. We should also look at the broader picture in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields since 35% of the STEM workforce is women (National Girls Collaborative Project 2024). Many of the challenges women face in these fields are the same as those in the game industry, so by widening our perspective, we could better understand what motivates them to choose a traditionally male-dominated industry.

But why does it matter if women are a minority? As with any other industry that creates products, games are marketed to a diverse customer base. Games are now more popular than ever, so the reasons why diversity and inclusion are important in the workforce should by now be a commonly recognised fact.

This is an excerpt of an article recently published Minna Porvari (XAMK) here: https://read.xamk.fi/2024/digitaalinen-talous/six-journeys-towards-a-more-equal-game-industry/

Author: Minna Porvari. RDI Specialist at Creative Industries Research Unit at South-Eastern Finland University of Applied Sciences.