#MeetIronGalaxy - Women ERG Edition

At Iron Galaxy, our team of inspired and motivated people are essential to our company's success. Our diverse backgrounds and views help us create broad, exciting, and unique gaming experiences. This recurring series of interviews is a chance for us to introduce them to you and let them tell their story.

As part of our recognition of Women’s History Month, today we are talking to members of our Women Employee Resource Group. Let us learn about their experiences in this industry.

Header image from left to right: Alicia Cano, Chelsea Blasko, Emily Farias, Jac MacHardy Anderson, Jess Wiedner, Marina Suarez, and Tiffani Koczenasz.

Iron Galaxy: Who are you and what is your role at Iron Galaxy?

Alicia: I'm Alicia Cano and I'm the Engine Lead on Rumbleverse.

Chelsea: I’m Chelsea Blasko, the co-CEO at Iron Galaxy Studios. My role oversees all aspects of product development, as well as the operational side of the business. All the game teams, HR, IT, Finance, and Operations report into my remit. A lot of what I do focuses on our People Value.

Emily: My name is Emily Farias and I do general programming at IG with the main focus lately being in the UI/UX space.

Jac: I'm Jac, and I am an Engineer on the Rumbleverse team.

Jess: My name is Jess Wiedner and I am a Content Capture Artist here at Iron Galaxy. Currently, I make content for Rumbleverse. I was previously a QA Lead.

Marina: My name is Marina Suarez and I'm the Lead UI Artist on Rumbleverse!

Tiffani: My name is Tiffani Koczenasz and I'm a UI Technical Designer on Rumbleverse!


IG: Who's an influential woman that contributed to your career?

Alicia: I don't really have a woman that I looked up to. I do think I've been lucky to know some really supportive wonderful guys though.

Chelsea: I’ve never had a woman mentor in games, so I aim to change that for other women. Luckily, I've met more women over the years and I'm actively looking to continue to build those relationships.

Emily: The first woman who comes to mind is Chelsea Blasko. She really uses her position to help diversify the industry as a whole. Her, along with all the women who I work with. We have a great community here that is really supportive of one another.

Jac: The first influential woman who comes to mind, that contributed to my career, is a professor from my undergrad degree in computer science, Dr. Erin Parker. She holds her students to a very high standard, but she backs it up with an equal measure of care in fostering their growth.

Jess: Chloe Bridges. She was the first lady friend I made after entering the world of game development. Chloe taught me a lot about why it is important to speak up as a woman in a male-dominated field and being fearless in doing so. Chloe always has had a vision of what kinds of games she would like to create for the masses and created her own company so she can achieve her dreams. It’s super inspiring to see her manifest her ideas into reality. Her company is called AvianRampage and they are regularly launching Kickstarters.

Marina: There are several game pioneers that I've always admired growing up, like Amy Hennig or Lori Cole, that pushed the boundaries of storytelling in the early years of RPG/narrative driven gaming. But the one that I believe is more relevant to me in the industry is Kellee Santiago. She designed and produced some of the most revolutionary indie titles and she is still one of the most relevant pro-indie development figures in the industry. It's important to keep supporting the independent dev scene and encourage developers to seek for different ways to experience game narrative.

Tiffani: It's tough to say that I haven't had a specific woman mentor throughout my career. However, working at IG, I've never felt more supported by other women in games. I work alongside some amazing women, who have gone out of their way to make IG a welcoming and supportive community. Along with a few other friends I've made along the way, the women here at IG have been some of the most influential to my career growth.


IG: How did you get your first job working in games?

Alicia: I didn't go directly into games after undergrad. I first went and worked at Disney for a while. After getting more perspective, I went back to school at Florida Interactive Entertainment Academy in Orlando. After that I was lucky enough to get an internship after that at IG.

Chelsea: I started out as an Executive Assistant (Production Coordinator) at EA Chicago. I basically just heard that EA was looking for Producers and thought, why not try?

Emily: I was lucky that I got to interview with O’Connor (Mike) here at IG. I wasn't quite ready for the position then. Still, he shared learning resources and stayed in touch with me when more junior positions became available—That's how I eventually got an internship which turned into a full-time position.

Jac: For my first job working in games, I landed a contract position with a company called React! Games several years after finishing an undergrad degree in music composition. I worked as a sound designer on a game called Super Dungeon Bros. I happened to know someone who worked there, and so my name came up when they realized they urgently needed additional sound design support on a tight timeline.

Jess: It's actually a pretty unconventional story as I feel like I just got really lucky. I had just graduated from Ball State with an animation degree and decided to go to Electric Forest with my roommates to celebrate graduation. Our group ended up camping next to the QA Lead at NetherRealm studios at the time and over the course of the weekend became best friends. There were like at least 40,000 people at this festival, so the timing of it all was very serendipitous. When I saw that he was wearing a NetherRealm shirt, I was like, "DUDE, I need a job!" We kept in contact after the festival and eventually I had an interview lined up as a QA tester at NetherRealm Studios. The rest is history, and we are still best friends to this day.

Marina: I started my game dev career working as a Concept Artist and Instructional Designer at Excelsior College in New York State. My Team managed to launch a few college programs that were solely focused on gamifying E-Learning courses and improving the accessibility for online media that the college offered. It was a huge milestone for me to discover that not only game development is exclusive to entertainment, but that there's also a huge world of learning fields in the tech industry that benefit from gaming support. I've always been very grateful for getting that opportunity. For me, making sure that content is accessible to everyone was an amazing part of my first step in this industry.

Tiffani: My first full time job out of college was actually as a game designer in military and medical simulation. I got to work on some really cool projects, such as a VR Anesthesia Education simulator. Working on these projects I was able to explore all different avenues of game design, and discovered my main interest was in UI/UX specific design. My goal was always to work on video games though, so after a few years I made a pivot and was lucky to find a role specific to my interests here at IG.


IG: When did you know you wanted to work in games?

Alicia: At university, I was looking at animated movies and technical art but that didn't quite fit for me. I had always liked games but didn't really think it was something I could do as a career. I had a few friends start working at EA Tiburon and thought it sounded really fun. The idea of getting to do something creative for work is something I'd always wanted.

Chelsea: I had no idea that there were jobs that I could be viable for in games. I first realized it was even an option when I heard about EA Chicago.

Emily: When I was younger, I would play Super Mario Allstars on the SNES with my mom. It was great (some of my best memories as a kid), and I would then draw out my own characters and levels. I always wanted to work in games but never really thought that it was something I could actually do.

Jac: I knew I wanted to work in games when I was just a kid. As the youngest of three in a family of gamers, I got the graveyard shift for my turn at playing Ocarina of Time on the N64. Every morning I was greeted by the beautiful title screen music, and it was such a poignant experience. I wanted to create moments like that for people through music in video games.

Of course, it's been a long journey since those days, and there have been many times where I've doubted whether I could work in games or whether I even still wanted to.

That said, I kept coming back to it, and I'm so glad I did! Working with Iron Galaxy is my all-time favorite job, and it's very rewarding to be here after everything I went through.

Jess: Originally, I wanted to work for Disney/Pixar and make animated films, but after going to college for my animation degree, I decided I wanted to explore game development instead. I knew that if I wanted to work for Disney/Pixar, I would have to move to California. I wasn't ready at the time to move away from the Midwest for a number of reasons. I knew there would be more opportunities in Chicago for game development than CG film, so I shifted my focus towards games after doing more research while in school.

Marina: I wanted to become a digital illustrator and UI artist when I discovered the 16 bit console generation. Back then, I had no idea if that was even a career path, but I knew that I wanted to create art for that kind of media. After I graduated in Fine Arts as a concept artist and illustrator, I joined an experimental Master’s program focused on Digital Arts for game development in Madrid. I learned the basics on Game Direction, Unity/Unreal 3 (UDK), UI solutions, 3D Modelling and a whole new world opened in my career. Twelve months later I was able to finish my first (small and fun) videogame, "Cut-Shumoto".

Tiffani: Growing up I played A LOT of Little Big Planet 1-3 on the PlayStation. I was super into their creation game mode and spent a majority of my time creating my own levels or collaborating with friends on theirs. I loved the LBP community and would receive generally positive feedback on my published levels. I think it was after one of the levels I collaborated on was MM Picked that I realized I might be able to expand my game design interests outside of LBP. I started taking Computer Science courses during high school and started modding in other games as well. I owe a lot to LBP for showing me I could have fun making games, as well as for providing such an accessible way to tinker with game creation at a young age.


IG: What's one thing you wish people knew about working in the game industry?

Alicia: I've only worked at IG so I think maybe I see the industry with rose colored glasses a bit. I absolutely love the people I work with. It is so awesome to come to work and have everyone be so passionate about what they do. It’s just amazing compared to other industries I'd been in.

Chelsea: Don't be afraid to jump into the games industry. Also know that anywhere you work, you should be treated with respect and dignity. Your views and experiences are important.

Emily: When people think about jobs in the game industry the obvious ones that come to mind are like production, programming, and art related ones, but there are so many different game development positions. There is undoubtedly some role that will fit your interests.

Jac: This is a bit of a hard question because it's hard to say what people know or don't know already! The thing I wish I had known is that working in games is a perfectly reasonable, achievable dream.

I guess that could apply to any goal you have - don't intimidate yourself out of believing in your goals. Just because you want something that you don't have yet, it's no indicator of what's actually within your reach - what you're actually capable of achieving.

Jess: People probably already understand that making games is HARD. You are going to encounter unexpected obstacles even if you are the best at planning things out. It can be extremely anxiety inducing for newcomers who haven’t shipped a game from start to finish yet. The best course of action to counter that anxiety is to talk to others who have a little bit more experience under their belt. Gain some insight from folks who work in different roles from you. The depth of knowledge you can explore through others is immensely valuable to your own growth as a game dev.

Marina: One of the things that I love the most is that game development gets done by an incredible combination of disciplines that have to sync and coordinate perfectly to seek a common goal. I think it’s important to understand how creative and complex game development can be and I wish I knew this better when I started working in the industry. As an artist, I highly recommend to everyone, to take your time to understand other disciples like design, engineering, user experience, quality assurance, etc. Because that is truly how you really learn, not only how to develop but also to work with developers. Which is almost as important as mastering your own craft.

Tiffani: It's really your coworkers that make working on games fun! Yeah the projects are cool, but for me what I love most is getting to work with such talented, supportive, and passionate individuals. The projects wouldn't be half as fun if I didn't get to work within such an amazing team.


IG: What would you like to see happen that would improve the game industry?

Alicia: I think the industry is moving in a positive direction as far as encouraging work life balance etc. I think as that continues to get better the industry will also get older which means the needs of older workers will need to be thought about more too.

Chelsea: I would love to see a continued focus on employee experience. We need to make sure that Industry Leaders are always listening to uncover issues before they become endemic problems.

Emily: I want to see the game industry keep moving in the current direction. It has become a welcoming space where all people can come and express themselves. We need more of that.

Jac: I would like to see an even more diverse workplace, and I'd like to see more studios prioritizing company and employee stability (the way we do here at Iron Galaxy!).

Jess: I have seen so much change since I entered the industry roughly 8 years ago and it's all mostly positive progress, however, the process of improving the climate of our industry is an on-going endeavor. I think a great building block is making sure women feel safe working in these industries. We have to continue to create safe spaces for folks to express what they believe in for the games industry.

Marina: I would love to see more diversity in every discipline and better cultural representation in our story telling. The industry is definitely improving in these areas, but there is a lot of work to be done. There's always room to improve the way we produce and consume media and I have no doubt we will get there soon.

Tiffani: I definitely hope to see continued improvement in making the games industry a very welcoming and supportive space. I think a lot of this stems from ensuring everyone feels safe, valued, and included at the office. While also feeling supported and encourage to take and enjoy their own time away from the desk.


We're constantly growing and learning as Iron Galaxy expands. If you want to make great things and work with inspirational people, view our career page and see if there is a fit for you.