S2 E1 Episode Title: Powering Up Game Dev by Making Space for All with Joanie Kraut
Welcome to Season 2 of Enduring Play: A Game Development Podcast. Where Season 1 expanded on the interviews from host Cheryl Platz’s critically acclaimed book The Game Development Strategy Guide, Season 2 covers new ground. The overarching themes: community and curiosity in a time of chaos. We’ll talk to educators, community leaders, researchers, event organizers, studio leaders, and many others who can help us understand how to sustainably scale our game development work even when.
Season 2’s bonus-length debut episode features a candid, constructive, and hopeful conversation with Women in Games International CEO Joanie Kraut. Recent reports indicate that 46-48% of gamers globally are women – but only one third of game developers identify as women or nonbinary, and that’s still far larger than the representation numbers seen in esports. How do we break these cycles, and how can we lift up marginalized groups in gaming in a way that benefits everyone – all genders, all ethnicities, all races, all sexual orientations – with an eye towards equity? Joanie Kraut has been exploring these questions in her work as CEO of WIGI, bringing diverse cohorts of allies to the table across the industry for years. We cover everything from Joanie’s incredibly relatable origin story in gaming to WIGI’s history of partnership with the Game Developers Conference and what all listeners can learn from the preparations WIGI’s GDC scholars engage in each year. It doesn’t matter what your gender is or what your career stage is – there’s something here for you, and there’s a seat at WIGI’s table for you, too. Game development is complex and challenging and we all know it’s dangerous to go alone – learn about the programs WIGI offers to anyone who needs guidance on navigating complex workplace scenarios.
For readers of host Cheryl Platz’s new critically acclaimed book The Game Development Strategy Guide, this episode hits the Motivators of Play from Chapter 1 particularly frequently as well as themes from Chapter 9’s focus on prosocial gaming and Chapter 11’s gaming economies – and it also hits the theme of the epilogue: in the end, your biggest challenge is not actually any individual game but building a sustainable studio that can survive each individual game launch.
Listen Now: Enduring Play Season 2 Episode 1
Episode Transcript [PDF]
Featured in this Episode
Joanie Kraut (she/her)
Chief Executive Officer, Women in Games International (WIGI)
Joanie Kraut is a finance and operations leader dedicated to supporting the people behind great games. With nearly two decades of experience across gaming and technology, she partners closely with studio founders, producers, and creative teams to build the financial clarity and operational structure that allow bold ideas to thrive.
Joanie currently serves as CEO of Women in Games International (WIGI), a global gaming organization supporting professionals across 80+ countries. She also provides fractional CFO support to early-stage studios and creative startups. She works alongside founders and production leaders to develop milestone-based budgets, runway forecasts, and investor-ready financial models that bring confidence to both creative and business decisions. She is especially passionate about serving as a bridge between production and finance, helping teams understand not just the numbers, but the story and strategy behind them.
Joanie has been recognized as one of the Top 100 Women of the Future in Emerging Tech (2023), the Most Influential CEO by CEO Monthly (2022 and 2023), and a Top 100 Global Leader in Finance by Women We Admire (2020). She also earned the CalCPA Women to Watch in Finance & Accounting Experienced Leader Award in 2019 for her contributions to both her profession and the community.
Show Notes
Supporting Links
| Joanie on LinkedIn | https://www.linkedin.com/in/joanie-kraut/ |
| Women in Games International | https://www.getwigi.com/ |
| Joanie’s CEO Monthly Award | https://www.ceo-review.com/winners/women-in-games-international/ |
| Joanie on the IGDA Board | https://igda.org/about-us/staff-and-board/ |
| ESA’s 2025 Power of Play Report | https://www.gamesindustry.biz/esa-48-of-video-game-players-are-women |
| 2025 GDC State of the Industry Report | https://reg.gdconf.com/state-of-game-industry-2025/ |
| Game Changers: The Rise of Women in the Game Industry | https://awis.org/resource/game-changers-the-rise-of-women-in-the-video-game-industry/ |
| Abios Gaming: Women in Esports | https://abiosgaming.com/press/women-in-esports/ |
| Computers in Human Behavior report | Bastian Kordyaka, Luisa Pumplun, Marlies Brunnhofer, Bjoern Kruse, Samuli Laato, Gender disparities in esports – An explanatory mixed-methods approach, Computers in Human Behavior, Volume 149, 2023, 107956, ISSN 0747-5632, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2023.107956 |
| ESA Nite to Unite | https://www.theesa.com/foundation/nite-to-unite/ |
| Game Developers Conference 2026 | GDC Festival of Gaming (WIGI is booth 454 in 2026) Cheryl’s 2026 GDC Talk (Spreadsheets Microtalk) |
Joanie and Cheryl nominated in 2026’s the*gameHers awards
Both Joanie and Cheryl are nominees in this year’s GameHERS awards: Joanie for the TrailblazeHER award and Cheryl for the GameHERS Icon award. If you appreciate their work and would like to support them and the many other deserving candidates, you can follow the instructions here and visit https://bit.ly/tghvoting to create an account and vote.
Voting closes March 31, 2026.
Episode Outline
| Scene | Time | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Podcast Start | 2:20 | Introductions |
| Level 1 | 3:43 | The State of the Video Game Industry |
| Level 2 | 7:59 | The Unique Value of Allies in Mentoring |
| Level 3 | 10:30 | Pre and Post Pandemic Policy |
| Host Commentary | 12:22 | Defining equity |
| Level 4 | 16:13 | Equity for everyone |
| Host Commentary | 19:38 | The Esports Gender Gap |
| Level 5 | 20:32 | A case study in esports |
| Level 6 | 23:30 | Changing minds together |
| Level 7 | 26:14 | Trust creating space for failure and growth |
| Host Commentary | 28:43 | Why does this apply to games? |
| Level 8 | 30:14 | Giving allies answers |
| Level 9 | 32:18 | Evolving representation in narrative |
| Host Commentary | 34:07 | Beyond books as identity research |
| Level 10 | 36:05 | The infinite context of identity |
| Level 11 | 39:05 | The economics of self-expression |
| Level 12 | 43:55 | WIGI at the Game Developers Conference |
| Level 13 | 47:12 | Getting into game dev |
| Host Commentary | 49:08 | Nite to Unite |
| Level 14 | 51:47 | Networking as your best authentic self |
| Level 15 | 53:59 | The power of curiosity |
| Level 16 | 55:36 | Origin story: Finance and gaming |
| Level 17 | 59:21 | How to exceed your own expectations |
| Host Commentary | 1:00:11 | Reframing job rejections |
| Boss Level | 1:08:30 | Focus on Community |
| Final Level | 1:10:20 | Links and Follow-up |
The Game Development Strategy Guide
Enduring Play is the companion podcast to The Game Development Strategy Guide: Crafting Modern Video Games that Thrive. Season 1 features the interviews that inspired the book, and Season 2 expands our understanding of how to create sustainable gaming experiences.
Enduring Play is the companion podcast to The Game Development Strategy Guide: Crafting Modern Video Games that Thrive. Season 1 features the interviews that inspired the book, and Season 2 expands our understanding of how to create sustainable gaming experiences. The book is available at all major online booksellers and at publisher Rosenfeld Media’s website.
Use code ENDURINGPLAYS2 at RosenfeldMedia.com to get 15% off your order – and all physical orders at Rosenfeld Media receive a free ebook. Podcast Season 2 offer expires July 31, 2026.
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ENDURINGPLAYS2
