Women in Games: Amanda McGinnis from Console to Closet

Amanda McGinnis shops around and finds the best outfits and accessories inspired by video game characters. Currently a junior English major in college, Amanda hopes to one-day work for a gaming publication, or become a community manager for a gaming community. In addition to keeping everyone up on gamer fashion Amanda founded Assassionista, a gaming blog. Here is my conversation with Amanda about her Tumblr, Console to Closet. Natasha: So, how did you come up with this idea? Amanda: I actually came up with this idea a few months ago, when I decided that I wanted to learn how to make jewelry. I had this idea that I could make jewelry that looked inspired by games for people who wanted to show their nerd pride, but still look fashionable. After one trip to Michaels, I realized I had no idea how to make jewelry. Fast-forward a few months, I was

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Interview: Whitney Wade (God of War Senior Producer)

On Monday, we posted about God of War Ascension. We were invited to the reveal of God of War Ascension’s multiplayer mode. It must have been funny to watch the room full of press trying to figure out what the team was showing us throughout the demo. After the demo we sat with Sr. Producer Whitney Wade to talk about God of War Ascension and what this new adventure means to the team. GamingAngels: Hi Whitney. Describe to us what it’s been like to return to the God of War series. Whitney: It’s exciting times! We love making God of War and so we’re happy to do it. The franchise is so strong, I think that in focus testing we did, fans want more. So who are we to deny the fans? The major reveal is the multiplayer concept. How did that idea come about? Is it something you wanted

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Women in Games: Jennifer Wilson of Night Owl Games

Continuing with Gaming Angels’ feature of showcasing women in gaming, we had the pleasure of getting Jennifer Wilson to answer a few questions for us. Jennifer is a developer for the studio Night Owl Games, which was formed in 2008 and is located in Austin, Texas. Their game, Dungeon Overlord, is a multiplayer strategy game that is available for play on Facebook now. Summer: First, can you introduce yourself and tell us how you got into working with games/ended up at Night Owl Games?  Jennifer: Well, I’m a partner in a firm called Creeris Ventures, which incubates start-up companies. Night Owl Games is one of the companies that we started up, so I was actually involved with the company before it existed, ha!  My very first Night Owl meeting was years ago at a coffee shop with Chris Mayer (who became the CEO of Night Owl Games) and the CEO of

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The ire of the Internet gets it wrong

Ah Internet. Sometimes you seem to only be filled with idiots. After reading Destructoid’s article on a BioWare writer being attacked on the internet, I can only feel disgust. BioWare, is an amazing company. They have an amazing track record and are filled with amazing talent. A couple of weekends ago we gave away keys to unlock the Mass Effect demo early. It was our most visited post all month. Gamers were begging offering bribes. It’s astonishing to think that only a week later there would be a group of gamers also attacking that same company. Everyone knows that fighting on the internet is a losing battle. Both sides look bad, no one wins and it’s just a bundle of negativity. This is the only fault I can see in BioWare’s GM Aaryn Flynn and Jennifer Hepler. It’s awesome to see Flynn come to her defense, but at the same

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Women in Games: Susan Arendt, Managing Editor at The Escapist

    Welcome, GamingAngels readers! It’s time to start bringing you more Women in Games interviews. Why? Because so many people don’t realize all the different ways that you can work with games. You don’t have to be a programmer, or an artist — you can take your skills and make a gaming-related career out of it, and that’s pretty awesome. We start with someone who can answer quite a few of the questions I’ve gotten (mainly, how do I start writing about games?) much better than I ever could — Susan Arendt, Managing Editor at The Escapist. Not only will you learn how she got into this and what she does on any “typical” day (even though there isn’t one), but you’ll also find out about what she loves in female game characters (and you can view her whole PAX panel on that here, hooray), what she looks for

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Interview: Adri Haik – Producer, PlayStation Home, SCEA

GamingAngels: What type of education did you need to have a job in the games industry? Adri Haik: I studied Computer Science for about two years at college, but most of my education comes from on-the-job training and playing a lot of games. I came to the game industry by way of virtual worlds and serious/training games, and I got into that because I saw a need and knew I could do the work. I started a company with a great group of partners and did that for several years before making the transition to the game industry proper. Many of my colleagues have degrees in computer science, art, and liberal arts. In your bio it says that you have two aunts who were coders, what kinds of projects did they work on? One of my aunts was an engineer for oil companies before making training software for big companies. The

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Interview: Veronica Tegan Founder of Team Robot

What does Team Robot do? Team Robot was founded by myself, Eric Coley and Peter Coley. We help people play games better, including ourselves. We develop applications that provide real-time strategy for use in-game. The applications do some pretty complex math on the backend, so gamers can spend more time playing games instead solving math riddles. Our first suite of tools support World of Warcraft players, suggesting the best gear, gems, enchants and reforges. We’re launching support for League of Legends later this year, and continuing our expansion to Star Wars The Old Republic, Diablo 3, and more. What was your job at Xfire? I started at Xfire as the first person to support the sales team, which was 2 people at that time. This included handling contract details, testing ads, creating new advertising programs, implementing ad server technology, and of course, tracking revenue. I basically did everything that wasn’t

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Interview: Deanna Nygren 3D artist for Certain Affinity

Crimson Alliance is an action role playing game for Xbox live arcade, set to be released September 7th.  I had the amazing opportunity to talk to one of the many talents behind this game, that has also worked in the upcoming Halo anniversary edition.  Deanna Nygren not only is capable of balancing her 3D artist job, but keeps up and plays video games in her spare time. GamingAngels: So what attracted you to working as a 3D artist? Deanna Nygren: It was my interest in technology, videogames, problem solving and love for fantasy/sci-fi that initially helped steer me towards a career as a 3d artist.  Additionally, I was attracted to working within a collaborative team environment, having artistic freedom and the portrayed culture of game development studios. Have you always wanted to create games? I knew I always wanted to be an artist.  Before my decision to get into games

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Interview: Brenda Holzknecht, Supreme Enabler at Geek Chic Furniture

While at a convention Gaming Angels Cherithe came across some beautiful hand made furniture for table top gaming. They also had storage solutions for comics and collectibles. Geek Woman was happy to interview Brenda Holzknecht Supreme Enabler at Geek Chic Furniture. Geek Woman: What was it that inspired you to start making furniture for gamers? Brenda Holzknecht: Well, being gamers, it was originally all about making furniture for ourselves. We gamers are a “can do” bunch. We can design and make our own furniture, but we realized sometimes it’s nice not to spend your time making the furniture as much as playing with the furniture. Wanting to spend your off time in a pleasant environment, gaming with a group of your friends is what it is all about. Not spending your off time designing, making and in many cases educating yourself on furniture building and manufacturing…a skill that many will

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Interview: Linda Currie, Design Director at Turbine

Linda Currie is a Design Director at Turbine, Inc. That not so little company that has two not so little MMO games that you might have heard of Lord of the Rings Online, and Dungeons & Dragons Online. LOTRO Rise of Isengard, which is the new LOTRO expansion will be coming out on September 27th Prior to joining Turbine, Linda was an independent design and project management consultant, and Creative Director at Create Studios, Inc. She was at while at Blue Fang Games, and was Design Manager of the design department. She worked as a Producer of Zoo Tycoon 2: Marine Mania, and was Lead Designer on Zoo Tycoon 2: Endangered Species and Senior Game Designer on the best-seller Zoo Tycoon: 2. Before that she was Executive Producer for Strategy First, and before that… well, you get the idea…30 years is a long time! Linda was co-founder of the former

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