Sheri got started in the game industry when a guy in her weekly Dungeons and Dragons group told her his company was looking for a game writer and he thought she’d be a natural. That was in 1989 and the company was Origin Systems. She applied and got an interview. Warren Specter hired her and two weeks later she’d left her job with the American Diabetes Association to begin what would be a long and successful career in game design and development.
Since that time she’s worked for such companies as Schell Games, Sony Online Entertainment, Electronic Arts, Cartoon Network, the US Navy and Kraft Foods as well as many others. She has worked on games as diverse as location-based entertainment in theme parks to facebook games, MMOs , educational games and more.
Her book, “Gender Inclusive Game Design-Expanding the Market” was published in 2005 and quickly made her one of the game industry’s leading experts on gender and computer games. She founded the IGDA’s Women in Games SIG and went on to found Women in Games International. She served as Director and Executive Director for both for over 10 years . During this time she also chaired the first Women and Games conference to be held in the US.
She has been named one of the Game Industry’s top 25 women by The Hollywood Reporter and one of the top 50 women in games by NextGen.com.
In 2005 she was awarded the IGDA’s Game Developer’s Choice award for her work in gender and games. The same year her book received a nomination for the Game Developers’ Choice Book of the Year.
A sought after speaker, Sheri has spoken at conferences from Australia to Chile. She is also a frequent speaker to schools and universities on the subject of games, gamification, gender and games, and application of games to STEM.
When she’s not making games, Sheri and her husband spend their weekends racing their Corvettes with NASA and other driving organizations.
Currently Sheri is available for consulting work in the area of game design and development .