Rare's Bhalerao Co-Organizing Women In Games Conference

Rare senior software engineer Nicola Bhalerao is co-organizing this year's Women In Games Conference. Jane Sinclair and Sara Kalvala, both associate professors in Computer Science at Warwick University, are also co-organizing the event. The Women in Games Conference aims to provide a forum for presentation and discussion of issues relating to women's involvement in games, including game development, game playing, and women as portrayed within games. Held at the UK’s Warwick University, the three-day event will take place September 10 - 12, 2008. This year's keynote speakers include MIT Media Lab’s Karen Brennan, University of Coventry’s Serious Games Institute Research director Dr. Sara de Freitas, Microsoft’s Developer and Platform Evangelism group member Eileen Brown, BioWare product manager Karen Clark, and SingStar director Paulina Bozek Bhalerao's previous credits with developer Rare include Viva Piñata, Kameo: Elements of Power, and Perfect Dark Zero. She is also currently working on upcoming Viva Piñata sequel Trouble in Paradise. Seeking to address why there are so few women working in the video game industry, Bhalerao is helping this year's conference focus on "what the perception of the games industry is to outsiders, and reasons why girls are turned off technology at a young age." Though the seminar is primarily concerned with women, men are also invited to attend. The deadline for registrations is September 5th. More information on speakers, accommodations, and the conference can be found at the Women in Games Conference official site.