Three priorities for creating a safe and diverse games studio
At Develop Brighton earlier this year, Code Coven's co-CEO Cinzia Musio advocated for improved support of marginalised people in the gaming industry.
Musio's talk, entitled 'Supporting Marginalised Genders in Games: Where is the Accountability?', explored studio initiatives aimed at promoting accountability and creating an atmosphere of diversity and inclusion.
She also introduced Code Coven's new Evolve program, of which GamesIndustry.biz is a partner. Evolve is a studio accreditation initiative that aims to set a standard for accountability and DEI in the games industry, with Vancouver-based studio East Side Games becoming the first studio to be Evolve-accredited.
"The real journey towards equity, diversity, and inclusion is not always going to be paved with easy wins," Musio noted. "Sometimes you are going to have to have difficult and uncomfortable conversations. Getting yourself comfortable with this is important to be able to embrace these conversations rather than shying away. You must become comfortable with the uncomfortable.
"It's not going to be easy to make systemic changes, and you're going to have to confront and unlearn the systems of privilege you have in place — it has to happen to move forward."
Throughout their talk, Musio emphasised that if developers and studios can commit to systemic change, they can prevent instances of discrimination and harassment from happening within the wider entertainment industry.
She acknowledged that while representation is marginally improving — a recent UKIE census showed a 4% rise in marginalised people working in the industry from 2020 to 2022 — systemic issues in areas like leadership have not seen any improvement.
Musio also noted the lack of diversity at
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