Top 100 Women in Games: Gabrielle Kent

Kent is deputy head of the games department at Teesside University, as well as director of the Animex Festival.

While studying Illustration in 1997, Kent undertook a placement working on Shadowman at Acclaim and realised her future lay in games.

After graduating, she joined the Pitbull Syndicate, going on to develop car racing titles for Accolade, Infogrammes, Atari and Midway.

Following this, Kent spent several years on the committee for the world’s first Women in Games conference, organising and hosting WIG at Teesside University in 2006.

She has delivered lectures on diversity in games around the UK and internationally to audiences of all ages.

At Teesside, her mission is to get the next generation of developers creating inclusive games featuring both diverse characters and engaging gameplay.

All of this is a staggering achievement alone, and yet there’s more – Kent often serves as a Games BAFTA juror and writes novels in her spare time.

The first in her Alfie Bloom series will be published worldwide by Scholastic this June.