The first ‘King & Swedish Games Industry Scholarship’ has introduced 25 newcomers to the game industry
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This scholarship has taught and advanced me in ways that no other program has in such a short time all while being extremely fun!”
In 2024, we partnered with King to create a scholarship for women and non-binary individuals focused on inspiring and empowering them to start a career in the game industry. Participants received a mentor from King, master classes from different disciplines in the industry and the opportunity to network at various conferences and events.
Looking at the figures from our latest annual industry report, only 23.7% of Swedish game industry employees are women. The number is increasing slightly each year, but progress is slow. Gender equality doesn't happen by itself – that's why we must continue encouraging initiatives like these to promote and create more diversity in the industry.
The ‘King & Swedish Games Industry Scholarship’ kicked off at the end of April 2024 with an intro day where the participants were introduced to the scholarship and met with their mentors and the other participants. For those with no previous game development experience, an intro course in game design was offered with FCV Sweden.
“This scholarship has been the best part of my year.”
The participants were divided into three groups, with the first group travelling to the Nordic Game Conference in Malmö in May. They were able to attend the conference's talks and workshops, visit King in Malmö and network at events organised by Sharkmob, Avalanche Studios Group and Women in Games Sweden. Thank you Nordic Game for inviting us!
The next group attended the world's largest game event Gamescom in Cologne, Germany in August. They were given access to the Business Area so they could network with both the international and Swedish industry that was there. We organised a breakfast with key industry figures and invited everyone to the Nordic Party for even more networking. Thank you Gamescom for having us!
The last group got to go to For Devs (formerly Game Summit Sweden) in Stockholm in October. As the conference is only one day long, we designed a three-day programme where on the first day we visited King's Stockholm office, had a round table discussion with Kim Belair from Canadian Sweet Baby Inc. about harassment and online hate and listened to a panel discussion about the future of the game industry at the Canadian Embassy. On the second day we visited the For Devs conference and on the last day we made company visits to DICE, Resolution Games, Star Stable and Game Town. We also had time for a quick visit to the National Museum to check out the exhibition on Romanticism where a video game was represented for the first time, ‘Unravel’ by Coldwood Interactive.
“An experience and opportunity unlike any other 🩷 thank you”
The scholarship offered five master classes with employees from King who shared their knowledge and valuable insights:
Therese Sander, Lead Level Designer and Marri Dragicevic, Senior Game Designer talked about their roles, what they do at King on a daily basis and how they got into the industry in the first place.
Anna Hernandelius, Product Director and Matteo Biasielli, Senior AI/ML Engineer talked about the development of AI in game testing and more.
Gonzalo Granizo, Early Careers Recruiter gave helpful tips on how to build a resumé and portfolio.
Abigail Rindo, Head of Creative talked about how to create a pitch and shared her own experiences from working in the game industry.
Anna Azarova, Concept Artist and Joel Åkerman, Art Director talked about what they do in their roles at King and shared their personal paths into the games industry.
Jingyu Zhang, Senior Globalization Producer and Debra Karneman, Globalization Manager held a short quiz on globalisation of games and shared some advice on how to think when adapting games to local markets.
“This connected me to so many helpful people in the industry”
In December, the scholarship ended with a Game Jam at King's office in Stockholm, where participants got to enhance the accessibility of a game in various ways, like changing contrasts, game design and settings. The group with the most creative ideas won and the evening ended with a joint dinner at Game Town.
25 people completed the scholarship and we hope to see them all working in the game industry in the future. We are looking forward to continuing to create new opportunities for more people to get their first foot into the games industry.
Participants 2024:
Do you or your company want to know more or get involved for the next scholarship? Get in touch with Anna at anna.ingler@dataspelsbranschen.se
