‘Women make awesome games.’ This camp helps them make more.
‘Women make awesome games.’ This camp helps them make more.
‘Women make awesome games.’ This camp helps them make more.
September 8, 2022
By Jonathan Lee and Marlena Sloss
Summary
Girls Make Games encourages young gamemakers to follow their dreams.
CEO Laila Shabir was growing up in the United Arab Emirates, she was constantly told what she could and could not do.
These subtle reinforcements of gender roles and restrictions around who exactly is allowed to enjoy particular hobbies inspired Shabir to start Girls Make Games, a summer camp where girls and nonbinary children learn all the basics of game development from coding to concept art illustration.
People told her there just aren't enough women working in games and games aren't something that women are typically interested in.
If girls don't play games, then Shabir questioned why she was making educational games that would only be played by boys.
So she started Girls Make Games in 2014 as a research project: what if she asked a bunch of gamer girls what kind of games they enjoy and games they want to see?
Shabir likened video games to books, in the sense that games had the power to influence her way of thinking and her perspective.
Reference
Lee, J., & Sloss, M. (2022, September 08). 'women make awesome games.' this camp helps them make more. Retrieved September 15, 2022, from https://www.washingtonpost.com/video-games/2022/09/08/girls-make-games/