The North American Game Industry - The Video Game Industry: Formation, Present State, and Future - page 93

per cent), heterosexual (92 per cent) and non-disabled (87 per cent) work-
force. It is also a youthful industry, with an average age of thirty-one and
average number of years working in the industry at fi ve. The majority of
workers, however, have two or fewer years experience in the industry. With
the exception of only 18 per cent, all workers in the North American game
industry have a college degree or higher (Gourdin 2005).
Undoubtedly there are cultural issues at some studios that discourage
greater diversity. In my work with game developers, there are two major
factors that discourage diversity within the game industry. The fi rst limiting
factor is the stigma associated with the label “gamer,” which, especially for
game designers, is often considered to be a job requirement. Although the
demographics of game players broadly considered is quite diverse, with 42
per cent of game players being female (Cross 2011), when one narrows that
lens to the “core” gamer community, the demographics quickly become more
male dominated, with only 28 per cent of women occupying this space (Staf
2009b). Thus, the unspoken requirement of the “gamer” title discourages
broader interest in game careers. The label “gamer” is a media consumption
identity that is lately unparalleled in other forms of media. Thus, an emphasis
on gamer identity discourages more diverse interest in the profession.
Predominantly, however, in my discussions with women game develop-
ers, it was the issue of work-life balance that discouraged their interest in
the fi eld. Nearly every woman I interviewed mentioned specifi cally that
they selected the studio they were working at because of a positive reputa-
tion for avoiding crunch and encouraging employees to “not live at work.”
Many of these informants, if they found these reputations to not hold true,
left to work at other studios. The combination of these two issues severely
limits the kinds of people who pursue game development work.
WORK ISSUES
The game industry in North America also suf ers from continual battles sur-
rounding issues of “crunch” and “Quality of Life” (QoL). Although these
problems have existed since the early days of the game industry, in recent
years public discussion and controversy surrounding those practices has
emerged. In November 2004, on the LiveJournal blog site, an anonymous
poster, “ea_spouse”, voiced some of the concerns that echoed those of the
developers working on Asylum. For others it was simply someone over-
thinking something that was common and didn't really matter, because at
the end of the day it meant they were still able to make video games. The
blog, written by the “signifi cant other” of a game developer, voiced frustra-
tions over work practices in the Los Angeles studios of EA.
Our adventures with Electronic Arts began less than a year ago.
The small game studio that my partner worked for collapsed as a result