Video Gaming Got Its First Major Union. Now What?

There is going to be history in Madison, Wisconsin. A group of game developers have gathered in person to await the results of a National Labor Relations Board election that will determine whether the quality assurance workers at Call of Duty developer Raven Software have the majority vote needed to unionize.

On May 23, Jessica Gonzalez, a former employee of the company who now works as a campaign worker for the union, said it was a beautiful day to unionize. Gonzalez announces the official verdict: 19 for and 3 against, as someone yells in the background. We won our union.

The window for challenges closed on May 31. The election results for Raven Software are now official, cementing a historic win for unions in the video game industry. Quality assurance workers at the Wisconsin studio formed the Game Workers Alliance with the help of the Communications Workers of America, the largest communications and media union in the country. The industry is doing more than just acknowledging its worst habits according to Emma Kinema, the senior campaign lead for the CODE-CWA.

Kinema says that we are entering a new phase in organizing.

Despite decades of poor working conditions, including punishing overtime, inadequate pay, and sexual harassment, the video game industry has moved toward unionization at a snail's pace. It wasn't until last year that North America's first union formed with independent studio Vodeo Games that discussions about unions and better working conditions came to the forefront. Kinema says that video game workers are in a unique position of falling under both the tech and media industries.

The harassment scandal galvanized workers to unionize. A group of employees formed A Better ABK to support better working conditions. Employees at Raven held a strike for nearly seven weeks after a dozen quality assurance workers were told their contracts wouldn't be renewed.

During a recent Washington Post stream, quality assurance tester Becca Aigner said that she was able to follow the examples set by A Better ABK. The group settled on the name Game Workers Alliance in hopes others in games would rally behind the bigger cause to improve workplace conditions.

We need a seat at the table to negotiate. She said that employees want job security and recognition that they are not a revolving-door entry position.