The essays in Antiracist Futures for Games and Play show how games are distributive sites of power that can become creative spaces for imagining and modeling alternative futures instead of replicating the dystopian conditions of the here and now. Bringing together game designers, scholars, and industry professionals, the volume examines race, power, and decolonial approaches to games; speculative design interventions; Black resistance and innovation in game history and culture; and how game labs and small studios can be generative sites for futurity. When created and experienced as antiracist interventions, games and play may become tools for challenging oppressive systems and opening liberatory pathways. Together, the pieces in this collection serve as a resounding call to action for the industry by demonstrating how intentional worldbuilding, design principles, and speculative critical practices have the potential to model antiracist futures from which other concrete forms of equity can flow.

TreaAndrea M. Russworm is Microsoft Endowed Chair and Professor of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California.

Soraya Murray is Professor of Film and Digital Media at the University of California at Santa Cruz.