On this episode of the SyrupArcade Cast, Brad Shankar and Dean Daley speak to Indigo Doyle, game designer and the creative lead at Toronto-based Pushing Vertices on Rollergirl.
Rollergirl is based on the life of Doyle, a Black woman who grew up in Belleville, Ontario. In the game, you roll around town on rollerblades exploring the neighbourhood as Naomi, a Black 17-year-old doing odd jobs to afford to fix her first car.
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As she skates, Naomi listens to music on her MP3 player, and she has a playlist for each of her moods.
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The world of the game changes based on the music around you, and songs are linked to the character’s mood in-game, which is then reflected visually throughout Rollergirl.
During the podcast, we ask Doyle about her journey as a game developer and discuss representation and diversity. Given it’s Black History Month, we felt it was important to highlight the difficulties Black people face when breaking into the gaming industry.
You can play a demo for Rollergirl on itch.io.
Image credit: Pushing Vertices
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