Anna Anthropy

Anna Anthropy
File:Anna Anthropy at GDC 2013.jpg Anna Anthropy speaking at the 2013 Game Developers Conference
Nationality	American
Other names	Auntie Pixelante, Dessgeega, Ancil Anthropy
Education	SUNY Purchase (attended circa 2002) The Guildhall, Southern Methodist University (attended in 2008)
Occupation	Game developer, writer
Known for	Developer of the freeware games Mighty Jill Off (2008) and Dys4ia (2012) Editor for The Gamer's Quarter

Anna Anthropy is an American trans woman video game designer whose works include Mighty Jill Off and Dys4ia.

Career

Game design

In 2010, working with Koduco, a game development company based in San Francisco, Anthropy helped develop the iPad game "Pong Vaders". In 2011, she released Lesbian Spider Queens of Mars, an homage to Midway's 1981 arcade game Wizard of Wor with a queer theme and "some fun commentary on master-slave dynamics." In 2012, she released dys4ia, an autobiographical game about her experiences with hormone replacement therapy that "[allows] the player to experience a simulation or approximation of what she went through." Anthropy says her games explore the relationship between sadism and game design, and bills them as challenging players' expectations about what the developer should create and how the player should be reprimanded for errors.

Rise of the Videogame Zinesters

Anthropy's first book, Rise of the Videogame Zinesters, was published in 2012. In an interview at the time of its release, Anthropy said it promotes the idea of "small, interesting, personal experiences by hobbyist authors ... Zinesters exists to be a kind of ambassador for that idea of what video games can be." The book also deals with a detailed analysis of the mechanics and potentialities of digital games, including the idea that games can be more usefully compared to theater than film (Anthropy: "There is always a scene called World 1-2, although each performance of World 1-2 will be different") and the role of chance in games.

Games

• Afternoon in the House of Secrets
• And the Robot Horse You Rode In On
• Calamity Annie
• Dys4ia
• Encyclopedia Fuckme and the Case of the Vanishing Entree
• Gay Cats Go to the Weird Weird Woods
• The Hunt for the Gay Planet
• Keep Me Occupied
• Mighty Jill Off
• Ohmygod Are You Alright
• Police Bear
• Pong Vaders (on iTunes)
• Redder
• When Pigs Fly

Bibliography

• Rise of the Videogame Zinesters Seven Stories Press, 2012. ISBN 978-1609803728
• ZZT Boss Fight Books, 2014. ISBN 978-1-940535-02-9
• The State of Play: Creators and Critics on Video Game Culture. Seven Stories Press, 2015. ISBN 9781609806392

External links

• Official website
• The Gamer's Quarter
• Anna Anthropy at MobyGames