With over 300 million copies sold worldwide, Minecraft has become the second-bestselling video game of all time, sliding right behind Tetris with 520 million copies. But this 2023 achievement is just the beginning.
With a Warner Bros. movie in the works and a 15-year anniversary approaching in May, the studio behind Minecraft is building a better world not only through the “power of play” but also by being one of the only studios in a male-dominated industry with a leadership team that’s majority women.
Mojang Studios
For Women’s History Month, we connected with five women from the leadership team for a “behind the screen” look into their roles, the diverse culture they’re creating at Mojang Studios and Minecraft, and the future of gaming with women at the helm.
1. Åsa Bredin, Head of Mojang Studios, the Microsoft-owned game studio that created Minecraft, believes having a diverse team is key in a creative industry. “Working in a team that is diverse, which represents our player base — not only on gender but through a lot of different aspects — I think that is a conduit for innovation. Innovation and diversity of ideas are critical for innovation to happen,” Åsa told BuzzFeed.
This viewpoint — which can be a rarity in the gaming industry — is most likely why Minecraft has reached millions of players, with over 40% identifying as women with an average age of 24 years old, according to the Mojang team.
Mojang Studios
Before Mojang Studios, Åsa had been a game engineer for more than 15 years. With two boys of her own, she’s personally witnessed how gaming can positively impact a generation of players. “I’m just excited that there are so many people with me, having seen their kids grow up with this game,” she said. “For me, it’s really this generational product where people throughout the years have been playing; it’s not the same game because it’s evolved.”
Programs like the above are why diversity and inclusion within their work culture have become an ethos for this majority women-led team — because without a diverse team, they’re unable to serve their diverse community of players across the world.
“I think that’s the key here: that you work in a diverse team where your voice is heard and taken into account,” she said. “We’re basically the biggest game in the world. We have been around for 15 years this year. And for me, and I think for a lot of people in the studios, it’s an honor of being the guardians of this iconic game.”
2. Annie Chen, Global Chief Operating Officer at Mojang Studios, has worked in the gaming industry for over 20 years. While she has been a part of the Minecraft team for over five years, you may be familiar with her previous projects, like Star Wars Battlefront 2 and the Battlefield series.
But even though Annie has been in the game for a while (pun intended), being a part of a predominately female leadership team is what originally attracted her to this role. “I think representation matters. I really do because I’ve benefited from that — and because it has been so male-dominated for most of my career,” she said. “It’s unlike any of the previous games I’ve worked on where there was not a lot of female leadership.”
Mojang Studios
She also believes that more women in leadership roles are really important for the gaming industry. “Women are also gamers. We don’t just like playing games that are more cutesy or anything like that. We play the gamut of games,” she explained to BuzzFeed. “And so I think in terms of Mojang, we’ve hired university grads, where they’ve come in and said, ‘It was super amazing to see female leadership.’ And so I think that is something that has attracted the new and career level of people [to our company.]”
But while it’s visually nice to see women at the helm of a gaming giant, it’s not all about how it looks. According to Annie, the leadership team recognizes their responsibility and focuses on how they structure themselves within the company. “[It’s about] how we show up as leaders [and] how we represent,” she said.
Mojang Studios
Having this form of representation for a gaming giant like Minecraft is imperative as more and more people who identify as women are seeing opportunities for themselves as players and employees within an industry’s culture that didn’t initially invite them to play. While the stigma around women gamers is still unfortunately present in today’s world (for example, the year-long harassment campaign Gamergate just happened a few years ago), Annie acknowledged it’s more normal to see women play video games today than when she was younger.
“I think that it’s almost like the industry is catching up a little bit to how society’s evolved into how they view gamers,” she explained. “I think the generation of gamers in the ’80s when I grew up, a lot of them are adults now with kids and families, and they still continue to play games; a lot of my friends play games while they have teenagers in their house. That’s perfectly normal now, right? So, I think society has evolved — and I think the industry has evolved with it.”
Mojang Studios
With the evolution of players, the leadership team at Minecraft wants to support their community as much as possible so they feel included. “Our community matters a lot to us, and so we engage a lot with them in terms of like, what matters to them, what are they looking for? How do we meet them? How do we engage creators to create with us,” she said.
For instance, one of their early creators was a mom gamer. “[She] lives on the Oregon coast with her kids, and she was creating maps and things like that because she happened to find it really enjoyable,” Annie told BuzzFeed. While these creator maps can be found in Minecraft Marketplace, this form of creativity allows gamers of all backgrounds to find a community they can feel safe to play in.
“The world is super diverse, right?” Annie said. “You’re always able to find a community. And I think that’s what things are like today, with different social media groups — you can always find somebody who has similar interests to you, even if they don’t live in your neighborhood.”
TAYTA GAMES / Via youtube.com
3. Ada Duan is the General Manager of Growth Products and Partnerships for Minecraft at Mojang Studios, meaning she oversees external partnerships (like Sony, Nintendo, and Google) to get Minecraft on as many platforms as possible.
And while she’s helping shape the culture as part of the Mojang leadership team, she is also the executive sponsor of Asians at Xbox, an employee resource group where she works closely with the co-leads to organize events, career development initiatives, or safe spaces for the Asian community.
“We gather and talk about things that really matter or the challenges that this community specifically faces, whether that’s in the industry or within the company,” she explained.
Mojang Studios
One of the ways Mojang Studios and Asians at Xbox have been creating safe spaces at work in a male-dominated industry is simply by being intentional about the kind of culture they want to create. “Culture doesn’t just happen,” Ada told BuzzFeed. “You need to really think about it, talk about it, and talk about where we are in the journey. Also, [you need to] recognize, whether you’re talking about your own team, at the studio level, or at the Xbox level, where people are and recognize people are [on] different parts of that journey and make sure you’re having those conversations.”
Ada explained that the only way to change culture is to understand where you are and where you want it to be — and one of the ways the majority women-led team does this is by accepting and acknowledging that it’s not just about diversity but also inclusion. “There’s this sort of sense of belonging that needs to be created for us to continue to become more diverse within companies,” she explained. “With over three billion gamers on this planet, in order for us to reach them, you don’t want to necessarily be made by a very homogenous group.”
Minecraft / Via giphy.com
While smaller gaming studios and larger studios like Mojang have already proven women can (and should) helm leadership roles, the rest of the gaming giants simply need to catch up. For instance, according to a survey conducted by Women in Games: “…of the global top 15 games companies, only 16% of women are represented in the executive teams.”
While this number is dire, it doesn’t mean people who identify as women should give up or never try entering into the industry. For instance, Women in Games stated on their website that in 2009, only 6% of women were in the gaming workforce, and in 2020, it increased to 22%.
Seksan Mongkhonkhamsao / Getty Images
“Traditionally people have said, ‘Well, I don’t really have a gaming background, or I don’t have gaming experience, like how do I get into the gaming industry?’ And to me, I always say to people that, ‘Where we’ve been in gaming is not necessarily where we’re going. If you look back, the gaming industry, similar to many software companies, started out as packaged products; we ship a game, and we move on to the next one,” Ada said. “And now, we’re really talking about games as a service and live operations. So, having people with diverse experiences from different industries and perspectives helps us prepare to propel and innovate in the gaming industry.”
This is where networking can come in handy if you or someone you know wants to be a part of the industry, Ada adds. “One of the things I encourage is just reaching out to people, whether it’s in your alumni network or people that you see on panels, and make connections, even if you don’t have any,” she said. “Because what I’ve found, and I know this to be true for myself, is if you reach out, people do kind of reach back, and you’ll find people who want to support and lift each other.”
Minecraft / Via giphy.com
4. Kayleen Walters, Head of Franchise Development at Mojang Studios, hasn’t always worked with games — in fact, her career originated in the movie and entertainment industry. “I’ve worked for, or with, probably the majority of the studios within Hollywood, with the longest stretch of time being at Lucasfilm, where I worked 13 years on the Star Wars franchise.
Just as Ada mentioned above, Kayleen is an example of how people with various backgrounds can enter the gaming space. “I was hired for this role because of my entertainment experience,” Kayleen told BuzzFeed.
“The team was looking at how we take Minecraft, which has over 300 million people within our community who don’t play the game but watch and engage online, and create products for that group of people as well. It was really to look at how do we expand Minecraft into broader touch points for our entire community to enjoy.”
Mojang Studios
One of Kayleen’s current projects is the Minecraft movie that’s slated to premiere in 2025 with Jack Black, Jason Momoa, and Danielle Brooks as just a few of the actors involved. While Kayleen couldn’t speak to the film itself, she did explain how she believes every single one of her projects — whether it’s a film, immersive experience, or consumer products project — is created with authenticity and creativity in mind.
“When I look at Minecraft, it’s this open-world sandbox game where the player has 100% of the agency,” she said. “So when I am expanding content, [I ask myself] how do I keep that same agency in a story that I’m telling? I’m going to provide a narrative and the plot, but that essential value is that you could be the main character. It’s not the definitive Minecraft journey; it is a player’s journey, and it is going to be different for any player. And so really embracing that is important to me as we figure out how we expand beyond the game.”
Minecraft
Since Kayleen is not the only woman on the leadership team, she believes this benefits the projects more because there is a lot more discussion, compassion, and support than she may normally have in comparison to a more male-dominated leadership team.
“We’re not just thinking about revenue; we’re really thinking about who is our player? Who is our audience? Who is our fan? And what are they needing and asking for? And so, how are we creating products that really serve the community and help expand the community in a way that is emotionally connected, technology connected, and community accessible,” she explained.
Mojang Studios
Kayleen adds: “I think there is a lot more ‘Yes, ands’ in our meetings than ‘No, buts.’ We want to come with open minds and ways of figuring out how we all come together to create something so much exponentially better than just really thinking about anything bottom-line driven.”
5. Jessica Freeman is the General Manager of Minecraft Marketing and has been at Minecraft for over seven years. Between working on creative campaigns and long-term strategies for the business, she says no two days are the same, especially when the goal is to meet the needs of their diverse, global community.
“We care deeply about our franchise being a space for people all around the world to be creative, express themselves, and connect with others,” Jessica told BuzzFeed. “We want everyone who experiences the Minecraft brand to feel welcomed, represented, and appreciated for who they are.”
Mojang Studios
Jessica adds when safe spaces are created within teams and work cultures, it creates more productive, happy teams that share a variety of ideas, which can bleed into the community of players to benefit from. This, unfortunately, doesn’t happen often within the industry. For example, according to Slate, “Over the past five years, industry giants such as Activision Blizzard, Electronic Arts, and Ubisoft have faced lawsuits over mistreating their employees, while grappling with increasing unionization efforts.”
“I know at some point or another, all of the women on our leadership team have experienced moments in our careers where we looked around the table and realized we’re ‘the only one,'” Jessica explained. “The only woman, the only person of color, the only LGBTQIA+ person, the only non-native English speaker, the only casual gamer. That’s a lonely place to be.”
The truth is, when women are at the helm of gaming giants, they know how to market to women and not treat them as a monolith. “Women come in all varieties, from all over the world, and are attracted to diverse genres of games. We don’t all think and act alike,” Jessica explained. “The industry has come such a long way, especially in the past decade, in recognizing that each game is unique and will appeal to a unique target audience based on the intrinsic and extrinsic motivators of that audience.”
Women executives can also make the business more sustainable. According to a Harvard Business Review article, when women were included in executive teams, organizations embraced change without being violent in their risk assessments. Essentially, women not only bring new perspectives, but they also shift how executive teams operate.
“Building healthy, sustainable businesses not only allows the team to create more diverse, inclusive experiences but also attracts more diverse, inclusive players,” Jessica said. “And we’ve learned when we put players first, we all win.”
At the end of the day, while no leadership team is perfect and gender equality is important, it’s vital for gaming giants to include women in decision-making spaces to show players that diverse, inclusive communities are built not just within the games but in reality, too.
“At its core, Minecraft is a platform for self-expression, creativity, and connection,” Jessica said.
“Being able to express yourself in your own unique way, be wildly creative, and share your experiences with others you care about is a fundamental human desire that Minecraft taps into,” she adds. “When you couple that with a passionate, global community where people from every walk of life feel welcomed and supported, you create a virtuous cycle.”
Mojang Studios
Do you identify as a woman and play video games? Tell us why you began playing and why you continue to play today in the comments below.
