Womenize! – Inspiring Stories is our weekly series featuring inspirational individuals from games and tech. For this edition, we collaborated with Kickstarter and talked to Nicole Amato, Games Outreach Lead at Kickstarter. She speaks about how her passion for writing and video games, combined with her academic background and professional experiences, led her from game journalism to game design and co-founding her own studio, ultimately shaping her current role supporting creators as Kickstarter’s Games Outreach Lead. Read more about Nicole here:
Hi Nicole! How has your diverse educational background in English, International Area Studies, and Library and Information Sciences shaped your path towards game design and writing?

I have always loved writing since I was little, and I have always loved video games, and about 17 years ago, I thought – why not combine the two? I had just finished my English degree, and I decided to start writing video game reviews. I got a part-time job working as a games journalist and got to attend some amazing shows, including E3, PAX East, and PAX West, as a writer. I met some amazing game designers and it eventually led to me working on video games and later making my own games, which was a dream come true. My degrees all involved rigorous writing and critical thinking courses, and my graduate program in Library and Information Sciences challenged me with courses on UX and UI, which helped shape the way I think about game design.

In your journey from writing and editing for video games to co-founding Cardboard Fortress Games, what pivotal moments or projects have most significantly influenced your creative vision and professional growth?
The first time I got paid to work on a video game was writing the story for the game Monsters!, which was funded on Kickstarter. It absolutely blew my mind that I was living my childhood dream – I never imagined my writing would ever be in a video game. Another pivotal moment was when we won the game jam for our tabletop game RESISTOR_, which we eventually took to Kickstarter. It was one thing to make the game and enjoy it, but for us to then win the jam made us realize we could make games that people liked, and maybe that people would even buy. It wasn’t a career path we’d ever imagined for ourselves, and that moment shifted our entire view of games and game design.
As Games Outreach Lead at Kickstarter, what strategies do you use to identify and nurture innovative game projects, ensuring they reach their full potential and connect effectively with backers?

That’s so much of my daily job! It’s really hard to say what strategies I use because everyone needs something different – board game creators need something different than video game creators, brand new creators need something different than established ones, etc. I meet with creators all the time, in person and online, to discuss how I can help them. With new creators, I talk them through the best strategies and plans to help make them successful – not just on the platform, but beyond as they make and publish more games. With established creators, I like to work with them to strategize on how best they can utilize the platform and their audience. For those making video games, it’s important to think about how they want to get the word out, whether that be Steam Next Fest, Wholesome Games, and/or PAX Rising – it depends on what kind of game they’re making. It’s important for me to look over their project, see what else they’ve worked on, and meet with them to figure out what they need and how best I can help them. It’s usually a collaborative effort!

Thanks for this interview, Nicole!

Nicole’s links: LinkedIn

 

Womenize! – Inspiring Stories Feature by Madeleine Egger