While charity may not be the first word that springs to mind when you think of the games industry, there have been several groups set up over the past few years that try to make a difference. From the US organisation Child's Play, that accepts donations of both cash and games to deliver games and consoles to children that are seriously ill in hospital, to the Xbox Live Arcade and PSN puzzle game Chime, which donated 100% of its proceeds to charity, people throughout the industry have long been trying their best to make a difference - and the Global Gaming Initiative is the latest such creation. A for-profit company that donates 50% of proceeds from each game to charity, their first title, an iPhone/iPad/iPod game called Sidekick Cycle, is available now. We sat down with CEO and founder Elizabeth Sarquis to find out more about the company.
Can you tell us a little bit about the concept behind Global Gaming Initiative?
We are building a company from the ground up that focuses on using smartphone gaming to affect global change. We choose a charity, build a game around their efforts and then sell that game. We donate 50% of the proceeds of that game to our chosen charity.
How do you choose the charities you work with? Do you look for smaller charities, where smaller amounts of money would make a bigger difference, and a game could help really raise awareness, or is there a mixture?
We choose charities that are best in class in providing a tangible good. We are avoiding charities where we can't track where the money goes. Our vetting process is also lengthy. For example, we tracked the efforts of World Bicycle Relief for nearly two years. We even sent two of our team members on a two week junket in Africa with them to verify their activities.
How hard is it to come up with concepts for games that tie-in with the charities? While most biologically based charities would lend themselves fairly well to a shooter, or a bubble bursting game, I'd expect it's a lot harder to come up with concepts that tie-in with some others!
Designing a game is hard enough, but making one thematically tied to a charity is twice as hard. The core of the issue is congruency. The game must deliver an emotion connection to the charity and be a great game at the same time.
How does the development process work? Do charities have an active role in the development, from concept to creation? Do they fund any of the initial development?
We are a for-profit, self-funded company, which does limit the role the charity can play. There are very strict rules for participation in profitable ventures by non-profits, so they are really just the recipients of the proceeds. That said, we do get to know them intimately through our vetting process and that helps in the game creation process.
Can you tell us a little bit how the money from each purchase is split up? Of the 99c/79p people spend on the game, how does the cash get broken down?
We donate 50% of the proceeds of sales from each purchase and from each in-game purchase.
Your first game, Sidekick Cycle, will also support micro-transactions. Does the same portion of money from these also go to charity, and what sort of things can people buy?
Mostly, we have coin packs, which help purchase different vehicles, outfits or sidekicks. 50% of proceeds from in app purchases go to the charity also.
In recent years, we've seen more and more efforts from within the games industry to support charitable causes, from Child's Play, to OneBigGame, the first non-profit publisher. Is this something you'd like to see more of in future?
That would be our dream. A lot of game companies already participate in this and we are excited for everyone that joins in. We are building a community of giving gamers at www.facebook.com/weplaytogive -- this site, updated nearly daily, is an aggregator of every effort by gaming companies to raise money for charities. We happily support every effort to use games to affect social change.
