Women in Games | Polygamer

Polygamer #85: Shannon Symonds of The Strong Museum of Play

Posted on January 9, 2019 by Ken Gagne

Shannon Symonds is a curator at The Museum of Play, home to the International Center for the History of Electronic Games (ICHEG). This institution in Rochester, New York, is home to 60,000+ artifacts of gaming history, from rare game consoles, coin-ops, and prototypes to design documents, periodicals, and transcripts. Shannon, who last month was profiled in the book Women in Gaming, recently curated the Women in Games exhibit, showcasing the contributions of generations of women to video games.

In this interview, Shannon and I discuss what gaming rarities ICHEG houses, where they come from, and where they go; the challenges in preserving a digital medium; what a visitor to the Women in Games exhibit will see if they look up; why Bahiyya Khan deserves a place in gaming history; what to study in college to become a museum curator; why Shannon was surprised to be in Meagan Marie’s Women in Gaming anthology; and what we both love about Star Trek: Discovery.

Stream the audio edition of this interview below or from iTunes, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Mixcloud, Amazon Music, Overcast, acast, Pocket Casts, Castbox, TuneIn, RadioPublic, or the Internet Archive. Click past the jump for links to resources mentioned in this episode.

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Podcast: Download (Duration: 1:03:09 — 29.8MB) | Embed

Polygamer #54: Amy Allison of WIGI on Girl Scout patches

Posted on October 26, 2016 by Ken Gagne

Amy Allison of the Vice President on the Executive Board of Women in Games International (WIGI), an organization that promotes the inclusion and advancement of women in the global games industry. In collaboration with the Girl Scouts Greater Los Angeles, Allison recently pioneered the introduction of a video games patch, offering young women hands-on lessons in video game development and design over the course of two workshops held this fall at Sony Santa Monica.

In this interview, Amy Allison and I discuss the inspiration for this patch, and how it differs from badges, loops, and other marks of achievement used by the Girl Scouts of the United States of America and the Boy Scouts of America; how these workshops address a pipeline issue for getting women into the games industry; how developers and publishers across the country can partner with WIGI to expand this program nationally; and finally, Amy’s experiences at the recent IndieCade and Oculus Connect and IndieCade festivals.

Stream the audio edition of this interview below or from iTunes, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Mixcloud, Spoke, Overcast, acast, Pocket Casts, Castbox, TuneIn, RadioPublic, or the Internet Archive. Click past the jump for links to resources mentioned in this episode.

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Podcast: Download (Duration: 49:53 — 23.7MB) | Embed

Polygamer #37: Game designer Carolyn VanEseltine

Posted on January 13, 2016 by Ken Gagne

Carolyn VanEseltine is an accomplished game designer and developer, having worked at such studios as Harmonix and Giant Spacekat. Her recent presentation at Google, "Everyone can make games now", underscores her belief that the freedom to make games is a basic human right, and that games should open and accessible to all as a medium of artistic expression.

But what does it mean to be a game designer? Does one need to know how to program, or is that the province of game developers? Do the interactive fiction made possible by game engines such as Twine and Inform qualify as games? What basic skills should a participant in the upcoming Global Game Jam or Ludum Dare events have? In this podcast interview, Carolyn and Ken discuss these topics and more.

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Podcast: Download (Duration: 48:16 — 23.0MB) | Embed