Better Games Together: One Year on and Going Strong
Better Games Together continues to strive for meaningful action to support the LGBTQIA+ community and move towards a more diverse and inclusive game industry.
With this year’s Pride Month just around the corner, we wanted to take stock of how Better Games Together started, where we are now, and our aspirations for the future.
One year ago, Metacore, Next Games, Supercell, and the non-profit We In Games, joined forces to build deeper connections between our industry and the LGBTQIA+ community. We partnered with Helsinki Pride collectively because we believe that by working together, we can do more, learn more and support this community more effectively. Here’s a look at what we’ve accomplished together so far:
Our work kicked off last summer when we attended the Helsinki Pride March in July of 2022 with a joint truck and hundreds of our colleagues and friends.
Later in 2022, mobile game studio Rovio joined our collective, making us even stronger. We are certain Rovio won’t be the last studio to join this movement!
In early 2023, we hosted a Pride Youth evening, in which a group of LGBTQIA+ youth from all over Helsinki got the chance to come and have a pen-and-paper game jam with game-makers from our organizations. They had a lot to share with us about LGBTQIA+ representation in both games and other media.
In the spring of 2023, we hosted a training event for all of our employees with a representative from Helsinki Pride. We learned about the history of LGBTQIA+ rights in Finland, current issues facing the community, and what we can all do to be better allies to the community.
Now, we are proud to announce that Better Games Together is one of the main partners of Helsinki Pride 2023! We will once again have a truck in the Helsinki Pride March and, for the first time, have a presence in the Helsinki Pride House. Our collective goal is to continue to support the LGBTQIA+ community that both make and play our games, not only during Pride Month but all year round.
As game makers, our mission has always been to create unforgettable experiences that entertain, bring joy, and connect people with each other. We believe that striving towards a diverse, inclusive, and equal representation amongst our industry, teams, and games brings us closer to that goal and enables us to make Better Games, Together.
We look forward to further strengthening and growing the Better Games Together collaboration within the Finnish games industry and beyond in the future.
Helsinki Pride Month is celebrated in June 2023, and it will culminate in the Pride March on July 1st, 2023.