Black Girl Gamersis an inclusive online gaming community that has grown from a small Facebook group to a large collective of Black women and Black non-binary people who uplift one another in the industry through content creation, IRL and offline events, education, consulting, and more. BGG announced on March 20 that they had consulted forForspokento give input on the gameplay and portrayal ofFrey Holland, the game’s Black female protagonist.
Black Girl Gamers CEO and Founder Jay-Ann Lopez spoke with Game Rant in a recent interview and continued the conversation of bringing more representation to video games for people of color, especially women of Non-White ethnicities. She also discussed what therepercussions have been from the lack of diversity and inclusivity in beloved franchises.
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Lack Of Representation Is An Issue
Lopez got her first console, a Nintendo, from her uncle at a young age. But growing up, she had moments where she felt ostracized because video games were targeted at boys, not girls. She described times when she would go to a family friend’s house and two boys would play video games in front of her, hardly ever sharing. That mixed in with rarely seeing a Black female character are reasons why she started Black Girl Gamers.
I also never saw a Black girl character, and if she was, she’s the neck popping, sassy stereotype, which was commonly leaned on for comedic relief for just all the media like reading the magazines, etcetera, and a lot of men sexualized female characters. So of course all of that all in one is ostracizing to a young Black girl, who’s interested in gaming.
When thinking of successful entertainment franchises, they’ll most likely be made up of a predominantly White cast or characters. According to research done by the University of Southern California, 75% of all characters were White in the top 100 films in 2014. While those numbers have likely since improved, the repercussionshave still impacted the public’s association with games. This is even more evident in fantasy films or video games.
The normalized association of fantasy, you think of European medieval settings whenever you think of any kind of IP:Lord of the Rings,Harry Potter…EvenThe Witcher, they’re all based in European settings.
Within those fantasy settings, it seems that they can have dragons, but have no people of color. They can have magic, but they will negate the very real, very historical existence of Black and Brown people in Europe in those same medieval or middle-aged times.
One of the most recent incidents that brought issues of diversity to the forefront was whenFinal Fantasy 16explained that the game had few-to-no Black charactersor people of color because it was “heavily featured” in medieval Europe; he added, “The story we are telling is fantasy, yes, but it is also rooted in reality.” However, that theory is disproved specifically by art during the medieval era, which was deeply explored in a Baltimore exhibit called “Revealing the African Presence in Renaissance Europe.”
The Shift In The Gaming Industry
Black women and people of color have been ostracized at different levels of the process, Lopez said. According to the International Game Developers Association, 81% of developers identified as White/Caucasian while just 2% identified as Black/African-American/African/Afro-Caribbean. These are numbers that could hinder developers from accurately portraying diverse characters, but some companies have moved towards improvement. Ubisoft typically hires consultants for its characters and settings, includingcultural consultants for the upcoming Japan-setAssassin’s Creed Red, and Electronic Arts has been improving character customization tools inThe Sims. But the existence of this lingering issue still has repercussions, Lopez said.
That’s definitely a repercussion of not being able to see yourself in the medium, and also parents and family not believing that there’s a space for you in that medium, so [they’re] not encouraging their children to even go down that lane.
But ever since Black Girl Gamers came to fruition in 2015, Lopez told Game Rantthat she’s seen a shift in the industry; the first being Black female representation. Between 2017 and 2018, just a few years after BGG’s creation, Lopez noticed more Black female characters were appearing, like Marina Ida fromSplatoon 2, which was released in 2017, and Black hair was being represented more. BGG has also partnered and worked with Meta, Google, Netflix, Samsung, Twitter, and others. Lopez said that these partnerships have helped position Black women in opportunities that they traditionally didn’t have.
Black Girl Gamers has worked with a lot of these brands, but a lot more beauty brands are coming into this space as well, because more statistics on women and social media has democratized gaming and brought consumers closer to the publishers and indie games…
We’re seeing a lot more crossover with non-gaming brands coming into the gaming space and working with collaborations, integrations, etcetera. Social media did a lot because [it’s how] Black Girl Gamers exists essentially.
Black Girl Gamers, which started in the United Kingdom, has since moved to the U.S., which is where a majority of their audience is. Lopez said that it’s “another step for growth” and a way for Black Girl Gamers to continue having an impact in the industry. In the future, Lopez hopes to expand to other places like West Africa.
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Source: University of Southern California (viaForbes),Baltimore exhibit: “Revealing the African Presence in Renaissance Europe,“International Game Developers Association
