How To Get More Women Into Coding: Online Gaming

Game developer and Fullflower Studio founder Anne Shoemaker comes from a family of web developers, so she had some idea of what coding is well before most kids do. But when she was around 8 or 9 years old, her parents introduced her to a program called Scratch, a free tool aimed at helping children learn about programming. From there, she was hooked. A couple of years later, already set with a solid foundation, she started creating on Roblox, a platform that unites gamers and developers while also providing an environment where people can create their own games. “My favorite game on Roblox broke, and I was really sad. I wanted me and my friends to still be able to play it,” she said during last week's Refinery29 Twitch stream. “I created a game that was similar. Then it got, like, 100 players and I was like, ‘You gotta keep going, that’s really cool.’” 

Sharing her story with R29 Entertainment Director and Twitch host Melissah Yang, a now 23-year-old Shoemaker is yet another example of a woman in gaming carving out her own path and transforming the industry in the process. She’s entirely self-taught, taking full advantage of Roblox’s free tools and scripts to figure out how everything works. As her skills grew, she had the chance to participate in the now-defunct Roblox Accelerator Program, which invited select users to work alongside Roblox producers to develop and release an original game. Shoemaker loves the program not only because it’s easy to pick up on, but also because it enables developers to instantaneously grow an audience and receive direct feedback from those who play their games. 

Today, Shoemaker is putting her all into Fullflower Studio, which she launched in 2020 to produce games — like pet simulation My Droplets and the fantastical My Mermaid Life — that are cute, feel-good fun and share a little positivity with the world, while also sharing tips and tricks for creating on Roblox on her YouTube channel TheMyzta. She may seem young to have accomplished so much at this stage in her life, but for Shoemaker, it’s all been a no-brainer. “I saw a bunch of male colleagues that were starting studios on Roblox becoming more established,” she said. “I was kind of just like, ‘Why not me?’” 

That can-do mindset is why Shoemaker is also passionate about seeing more women and diverse folks get involved in game development — something that can happen with more frequency thanks to accessible online gaming. “Women have a different perspective — I think that’s the way for any kind of diversity. You need a lot of different perspectives to create experiences for the entire world, not just a small portion of the world,” she said. In her mind, the more women who are visible and at the forefront of gaming, the likelier it is that other young girls and women will feel seen, represented, and realize that they can build their own careers in gaming too. And, to make sure they feel welcome, Shoemaker strongly believes that people with already established careers should be inviting people into the industry and offering more guidance. 

If you’re thinking about developing your own games and don’t know where to start, Shoemaker has a few tips. Find games that you like, explore how they’re actually made using the platform’s tools, mess around with the different source codes available, and give yourself the freedom to play around and discover what you can do. She also recommends prioritizing collaboration by reaching out to other developers you’re a fan of and asking to pick their brain or even work on something together. You’ll be surprised, she says, by how many people are genuinely willing to help you learn. 

As for where Shoemaker sees herself in five years’ time? “I hope that I have a lot of really great games out there that people play, are really happy with, and enjoy,” she says. “That’s all I really care about — it’s just continuing to create art and sharing it.”