Seeing games through the eyes of women

STORY BY DYLAN PAISLEY

She Got Game host Cailleah Scott-Grimes has turned to Kickstarter to raise money for an in-depth documentary about women and video games.

She Got Game is a YouTube channel about women and gaming that Scott-Grimes started.

“We’re also developing a full-scale documentary. The main idea behind the project is to see what the world of gaming is like through women’s eyes,” said Scott-Grimes.

In March Scott-Grimes started a Kickstarter to fund the documentary. “I’ve just always kind of known about Kickstarter,” said Scott-Grimes. “It was a great way to get people involved in a project.”

The money raised is going toward production fees, equipment and travelling to different conventions.

The possibility of falling short of her goal is not Scott-Grimes’ only problem – she has had to endure some harassment and backlash because of her female centric Kickstarter.

“It’s funny even on Kickstarter somebody sent me a message saying things like ‘you’re such a poser,’” said Scott-Grimes. “I was like, really, I’m pretty sure that in the first two minutes of my video I explained that I’m not that much of a hard-core gamer.”

This type of “fake geek girl shaming” is common in the gaming and nerd world with most guys feeling obligated to test a girl’s knowledge of the things she likes and if she gets a question wrong she’s considered just faking being a nerd, geek or gamer for attention.

Cailleah Scott-Grimes and my co-worker Dominique Skerritt admiring nintendo’s history at Nintendo World, NYC

This is not the first time a female gaming Kickstarter has taken flak. Anita Sarkeesian was brutally harassed because of her feminist gaming Kickstarter Tropes vs. Women in Video Games.

“That was really intense. Some of the comments they wrote to her were some of the meanest things that I have ever heard,” said Scott-Grimes.

Scott-Grimes got into video games when she was young when her dad would bring home old computers and video games from his work. She played games like Kings Quest, Duke Nukem and Unreal Tournament. She is currently playing Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword on the Wii and indie game Knytt Underground on the Wii U.

Gaming is a hobby that is still considered predominately male.

“I think it’s more important on the development side to have more women on the team,” said Scott-Grimes “I don’t think we need to make games for women, we need more games with women behind them.”

The project has raised $4,625 of its $10,000 goal with less than 10 days to go, so there is a possibility the project will not be funded.

“Our heart is really in this project and I definitely want to continue regardless of the funding.I think if we cut back on the scale and maybe have the project develop much more slowly, maybe we would try again in the future and make some changes and get more people involved,” said Scott-Grimes. “But I definitely don’t want to give up on it.”