Retro video gamers learned long ago that a little inclusivity goes a long way. Pac-Man set arcades ablaze in the early 1980s, then soared again when developers launched a sequel featuring a female protagonist.
Ms. Pac-Man endures as a classic once hailed by a trade publication for having “the broadest appeal of any game this magazine has ever seen. … Women love it. Men love it. Children love it.”
The power of that universal appeal serves as a reminder that inclusive design connects with new audience segments and creates a more dynamic and engaging experience for all players. Games thrive when the characters are as diverse as the players at the controls. It’s the driving force behind the Geena Davis Institute’s acclaimed new Playbook for Inclusive Game Design, a free digital tool for creative development.
The GDI Playbook: A Framework for Inclusive Game Development
Created with help from a global advisory council of game industry leaders, the GDI Playbook provides a framework to help understand, reflect, and address possible bias in narratives and character development.
The State of Representation in Video Games: Key Statistics
Consider some of the GDI statistics that show the importance of understanding the emerging trends in the gaming population – and why the industry has taken note:
- 46% of players are female, but just 20 percent of all characters are girls/women
- 31% of players have a disability, but only 0.1 percent of characters are shown with a physical disability
- Nearly 9 in 10 leading characters are white
- Only 0.03% of characters were identified as LGBTQIA+
What Industry Leaders Say About Inclusive Gaming
Fortunately, companies like Ubisoft, Activision Publishing and others who advised on developing the Playbook, recognize that inclusivity makes for a more dynamic gaming community.
“We think of it as, ‘How can we invite as many players to experience our worlds?’’’ said Raashi Sikka, the Chief Diversity, Inclusion, Accessibility and Social Impact Officer at Ubisoft. “For us, that means that our worlds – the games that we create – need to be enriching, they need to be fun, they need to be accessible and they need to be welcoming.
“It’s important for players to see themselves represented in these worlds that we create, but also to give them the opportunity to experience other realities and different cultures. I think that’s where the magic tends to happen.”
Where can things go from here? For this Spotlight, we asked our circle of gaming experts to look into the future with an eye toward how the GDI Playbook can continue to drive the conversation.
“One of the very powerful things around this is that the GDI Playbook acknowledges that this is a journey and people start off at different points in that journey,’’ said Adrian Ledda, the Director of Inclusive Game Design at Activision Publishing.
“And for folks interested in the gaming industry, seeing a resource like this ensures that they know that people in the industry take this seriously. (Inclusion) is not just a fringe part of the design, but something that so many people understand to be important, not just for themselves or gamers, but for future gamers as well.”
From Research to Action: How the GDI Playbook Came to Be
Geena Davis launched the Institute specifically to gather the data that could help address inequitable media representation. GDI had long been interested in applying the same scrutiny to the video gaming industry that it had to movies and television, largely because of gaming’s cultural impact on young minds.
A partnership with Equimundo and funding from the Oak Foundation powered the research behind “Double-Edged Sword of Online Gaming.’’ The revealing study by GDI was released in 2021 and promoted conversations about gender equality and healthy masculinity. There were also concerns about the tropes and stereotypes surrounding female characters, who were often portrayed as highly sexualized with very little sense of agency. Female characters were objects to be conquered and possessed.
Equipped with the data from the 2021 study, Madeline Di Nonno, President and CEO of the Geena Davis Institute, recognized that the organization was uniquely poised to make an impact in the gaming space. GDI could do what it has done in movies and television for gaming, namely enhance on-screen diversity and ensure more nuanced portrayals.
“We felt that there was a need to provide a turnkey digital platform that was free to help all types of global game developers, game publishers, engage and educate themselves when it comes to inclusion and belonging,’’ Di Nonno said.
The resulting GDI Playbook offered best practices, game case histories, and interactive modules to demonstrate how inclusive portrayals in game development can be created and easily applied. And it’s not just gender. GDI offers guidance for developers as they explore how to account for race and ethnicity, LGBTQIA+, older characters, diverse body types and disability representation.
Susanna Pollack, the president of Games for Change (G4C), noted that with 3 billion gamers worldwide, games have become a powerful force in shaping identity.
“Representation in games isn’t just about visibility—it’s about agency,’’ Pollack said. “When players see characters like themselves overcoming challenges, leading adventures, and shaping stories, it reinforces the idea that they, too, can be leaders and innovators in their own lives.”
For 20 years, Games for Change has seen gaming evolve from entertainment to a dominant media form, influencing how people understand themselves and others. Pollack said that programs such as the G4C Student Challenge empower young people to not just play games but create them—telling their own stories and addressing issues that matter to their communities.
“When games rely on narrow portrayals or limit certain characters to secondary or stereotypical roles, it sends a message about who belongs at the center of the story,’’ she said. “For boys, a steady diet of male-dominated narratives can reinforce traditional ideas of power and heroism, often sidelining emotional depth and collaboration. For girls and non-binary players, the absence of prominent heroic figures can suggest their stories hold less weight, shaping perceptions of what’s possible both in games and in real life.
Adrian Ledda, who leads Inclusive Game Design at Activision Publishing, spent the early part of his career as a programmer for the acclaimed Guitar Hero video game series. Long before that, he experienced the power of representation first-hand.
As a teenager, Ledda said, he came “from a family that was not yet quite as accepting of LGBTQ + identities.” A game called The Sims, however, allowed him to create a male character who interacted with other male characters in a romantic way, such as flirting.
“And this was not something that was allowed or possible in my world. In fact, it wasn’t safe to do so,’’ Ledda recalled of his high school days. “But being able to see that representation of different romances or relationships, it opened up a world to me to know that if this was a game and maybe it wasn’t real, but it felt real and there was something in there that I saw reflected in myself.”
Ledda is hardly alone. According to the Entertainment Software Association, about 11 percent of gamers identify as LGBTQ+. Data compiled by GLAAD puts that figure at 17 percent.
“Instead of having to fear who I was or who I could be, I found that maybe there’s someone else out there like that,’’ he said. “So the connection of who we are as human beings or who we are not yet as human beings – or maybe most importantly who we can be – is where I see people ‘get it.’”
Despite the diverse community of gamers, their reflection on screen is significantly lacking.
The GDI Playbook is essentially an answer to the question: How can we do better?
“The game industry is at a point where authentic representation and meaningful storytelling must be central, not an afterthought,” Pollack said. “Research and frameworks like the GDI Playbook provide essential guidance for developers to create more engaging and representative gaming experiences. By outlining best practices in game design, community management, and workplace culture, the Playbook has helped stakeholders move beyond aspirations to concrete action.”
Diane Urban, a former Disney digital producer/product manager who serves as GDI’s video game outreach consultant, agreed.
“When we were thinking about the direction of the Playbook, the overriding feeling was to make it approachable,’’ said Urban, who has more than 15 years of experience in children’s digital learning and entertainment. “We didn’t want people coming in thinking that they would be critiqued or be scored.”
Urban said the overriding mission was to equip creators with the tools to make positive shifts in representation and inclusion within the gaming world.
“Our intention is to provide a space of learning and awareness around the research and insights our team put together,’’ she said. “It was done with the tone of: ‘Come with us on this journey.’”
Out of the total online population, 72 percent of women play video games (that figure is 81 percent for men), according to the Global Gamer Study.
Understanding the experiences and preferences of women who play can empower game creators to build narratives that reflect the richness of the human experience.
Success Stories: How Inclusive Game Design is Changing the Industry
At Ubisoft, Sikka leads strategic initiatives to enhance workplace diversity and foster a culture of belonging for upwards of 18,000 employees globally. And it’s clear that the messaging is taking root.
A year ago, Ubisoft released a game called “Assassin’s Creed Mirage.” From the start, Ubisoft Bordeaux set off to accurately depict 9th-century Baghdad and very clearly articulated their core intention from the start. Sikka said they asked themselves, “How do we ensure that we create a game that has a positive portrayal of Middle Eastern and Arab cultures and communities away from the typical stereotypes that we tend to see in mainstream media?”
Along the way, the team worked with a variety of historians who had expertise in that time period and worked with consultants who specialize in language and culture.
The result? A hit game that was also honored at the Arab Game Awards in January for best Arabic Localization.
To Di Nonno, success stories like Assassin’s Creed Mirage, demonstrate the ethos of the GDI Playbook. “Everyone wins when we close the gap between who the players are and what they see on screen,’’ she said.
The Future of Inclusive Gaming: What Comes Next for GDI?
GDI knows the playbook will need to evolve, in part to keep up with the demand of a rapidly expanding global market. (The GDI Playbook summary has already been translated into eight Asian languages.)
Continued funding is a major key. The plan is to keep the advisory council intact as the platform expands and secures more case studies to help bring the successes and challenges into focus. The Geena Davis Institute also plans to continue monitoring content representation in hopes that the numbers start trending up.
“We have a chance to make gaming more global and to meet players with where they’re at,’’ Ledda said, “because we can have educational resources, like the Playbook, that guide us through ways to understand where we can think more inclusively.”
Everyone wins when we close the gap between who the players are and what we see on screen. The success and popularity of inclusive games underscores the appetite for such dynamic characters, and the dramatic response to the GDI Playbook highlights how the gaming industry embraces the call to action.
“It’s been very positive,’’ Di Nonno said. “We have comments and emails from people, and it’s been an avalanche of questions – not demands. People want globalization, and we’re still garnering enough feedback to understand how to make sure people can navigate to what they want to see.
“Because the Playbook aggregated such an enormous repository of resources, the platform – and its ability to change the face of gaming – will only continue to expand.”
Check out the GDI playbook here.
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