Lepidus: What is Artifact and Atari doing to help make female gamers feel welcomed and respected in the game? Will there be prominent women on the customer support team, and is the marketing strategy focused on portraying Horizons' female characters in a respectful, non-sex-object manner?

David Bowman: We are creating a game that appeals to humans. We aren’t using the exploitation of women as a selling point for 18-25 year old males. Male and female characters have equal chance to excel in all aspects of the game and assets are equally developed to support their game play. We’ve also provided a wide variety of activities to participate in within the game besides just killing monsters, whether this will specifically appeal to women will be seen after we are live. The characters of Istaria are not wrapped up in the male and female roles of this world, they’re just recovering from generations of racial hatred and bigotry and are attempting to build a new world where they cooperate for the benefit of all.

We have women working in both development and support at all levels.