{"id":46414,"date":"2016-04-01T19:27:34","date_gmt":"2016-04-01T19:27:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/?p=46414"},"modified":"2016-04-01T20:26:00","modified_gmt":"2016-04-01T20:26:00","slug":"blanket-fort-chats-game-making-with-meagan-byrne","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/?p=46414","title":{"rendered":"Blanket Fort Chats: Game Making With Meagan Byrne"},"content":{"rendered":"

Blanket Fort Chats: Game Making With Meagan Byrne<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

FemHype: the safe space for women & nonbinary gamers <\/a>
\n2016-04-01<\/p>\n

Miss N<\/a><\/strong> (Nicole Pacampara)<\/p>\n

\u201cBlanket Fort Chats<\/a>\u201d is a weekly column featuring women and nonbinary game makers talking about the craft of making games. In this week\u2019s post, we feature Meagan Byrne<\/a>, a Toronto<\/a>-based Game Design student currently working as a Peer Mentor for her school\u2019s Aboriginal Initiatives office and an active member of her school\u2019s Aboriginal Student Group. She hopes to create games that reflect her M\u00e9tis<\/a>\/Cree<\/a> roots and bring new stories to video game players.<\/em><\/p>\n

Miss N<\/strong>: Can you tell us a little bit about your background and how you got into making games?<\/p>\n

Meagan<\/strong>: I actually started out in the live production\/theatre field doing lighting design and event planning, but then the recession hit and I couldn\u2019t find full-time work anymore. As my last contract was starting to wrap up, I took a really hard look at the job market. It was clear that if I stuck with this career, I was most likely never going to be able to rise above the poverty line. So I looked at what market was growing, and lo and behold, I saw the gaming industry!…<\/p>\n

…Miss N:<\/strong> You\u2019ve previously described Wanisinowin<\/a> as a game about \u201cbeing lost or unsure of your place in the world.\u201d What drew you to this theme?<\/p>\n

Meagan<\/strong>: I wasn\u2019t told straight up that I was native until I was at least a pre-teen. It wasn\u2019t really a shock, it was more of a \u201cthat makes sense\u201d thing. What was hard was the rejection from the native community my aunt brought me to. Almost right away I was dismissed because my skin was too light or I because I didn\u2019t grow up on a reservation. I didn\u2019t feel comfortable going to \u201cnative\u201d events or Friendship Centres. Was I going to be thrown out of there, too? My mother was not interested in embracing her identity, neither were my siblings, so I acted like I didn\u2019t care either.<\/p>\n

My aunt was my only connection, but it felt too distant that way. I felt that if this is what I am, then why do I feel like a fraud or an outsider? It was really only because of the growing Native community at my school and our Aboriginal Student Success Officer that I was able to find my path and begin to meet with other First Nations, M\u00e9tis, and Inuit students, and talk to elders.<\/p>\n

I know I am not the only Native person who feels this way. I\u2019m sure even outside of the issue of Native identity, many people feel the pain of unsure cultural identity. I wanted to make a game that explored that and maybe work through my own issues of belonging…<\/p>\n

Read the entire interview here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Blanket Fort Chats: Game Making With Meagan Byrne FemHype: the safe space for women & nonbinary gamers 2016-04-01 Miss N (Nicole Pacampara) \u201cBlanket Fort Chats\u201d is a weekly column featuring women and nonbinary game makers talking about the craft of making games. In this week\u2019s post, we feature Meagan Byrne, a Toronto-based Game Design student […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,24,19,13743,8,3015,25],"tags":[23392,23399,23394,23393,23395],"class_list":["post-46414","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","category-arts","category-canada","category-interviews","category-media-archive","category-native-americans","category-women","tag-femhype","tag-femhype-the-safe-space-for-women-nonbinary-gamers","tag-meagan-byrne","tag-nicole-pacampara","tag-wanisinowin"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46414","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46414"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46414\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46415,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46414\/revisions\/46415"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}