2020 is the year of the girl gamer.
In 2019, black women gamers received a big win. We are a main playable character in the upcoming video game Deathloop. League of Legends has added it’s first black girl playable character in its 11 year history. Overwatch will be debuting their first black woman character with the release of Overwatch 2. The representation is happening!
The plan for 2020 is to keep this momentum going.
Starting with the first major Girls Only LAN party in NYC. League of Ladies is a Local Area Network (LAN) party designed to be a safe space for women gamers. Women will be able to learn and improve in various games in a safe, positive environment. League of Ladies welcomes all women regardless of age or skill level. This is your time to “git gud”.
The event will have tournaments for various fighting games (Smash, Tekken, Street Fighter, etc), and will also be live streamed on the event coordinator’s Twitch channel. Event hosts will include Player 3 of LAN Party Podcast and Frankey Smith aka Fantastic Frankey.
The Geek Caster women will be checking out this event when it happens in March, and we will definitely be talking about it in studio before and after. My personal hope, is to see more women of color in the competitive scene and in eSports in general. Developers gave us a little bit of what we wanted, but creating a larger presence in competitive gaming will definitely show how serious a demographic we are.
Anyone who would like to support can do so via the League of Ladies Kickstarter or by tuning into the League of Ladies Twitch stream in March! Tell your friends, and remember: Heroes never die.