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Veteran Sony developer Ramone Russell has said that the best PlayStation games are made when there are diverse voices in the room. Speaking to Game File’s Stephen Totilo, Russell opined that having developers from various backgrounds result in better games that are more representative and accurate.
Making accurate and diverse PlayStation games isn’t DE&I, says Sony dev
Russell’s interview mostly revolved around MLB The Show 24’s Negro Leagues mode, but he also quoted the example of Insomniac’s Marvel’s Spider-Man games. “Spider-Man can’t be that good of a game without that development team being so diverse, and being so representative, and listening to their Afro-Latino and their Black employees who would go, ‘Miles Morales doesn’t walk the same way Peter Parker does. Miles Morales would dap people up. He wouldn’t give them handshakes,’” Russell explained.
Russell added that Sony Interative Entertainment is a for-profit entity, and has a responsibility to increase shareholder value but making some of the best games out there. And in order to make the best games, Russell argues that it’s important to assemble people from various backgrounds. “This isn’t DE&I [diversity, equity, and inclusion],” Russell concluded. “This is us being: ‘We need to be accurate.’”
The full interview is available on Game File (paywalled).