University of Southern California is considered the top most school when it comes to graduate programs for game designers, so if there is a certain trend shift at their campus, it will definitely reflect in the industry as well.
What University of Southern California is suggesting right now is that the generally male-dominated video game industry might be seeing a change in gender statistics. This is so because right now, women are outnumbering men at USC’s graduate video game design program.
And in all honesty, this is a good tiding because it has been considered a norm for a game to have a male protagonist and part of the reason for it is that most of the people designing the games are males. Tracy Fullerton, a professor and overseer of the program at USC considers the growing number of females as a move towards changing that:
We live in a culture where the first impulse is to have a male main character, to assume a male gaze on the screen. That’s got to change. Young women need characters to have as role models. It’s important. The more that games become a key medium, the more important it becomes for this to happen.
University of Southern California has been ranked number one for game designers by Princeton Review and right now, a majority of students enrolled there are looking to change how games are made. I say that because one student, Stephanie Henderson, who replicates the thoughts of many game designers at USC says “there’s not enough stuff that I would want to play.”
We predict a major shift in the video game industry’s demographics – especially those concerning the game developers – is going to come in the next few years. Do you agree?
Thanks, LA Times.
