The Guild is a web-based sitcom focusing on a World of Warcraft guild and its members. Using hilarious stereotypes of the online gaming world and immense originality, The Guild has achieved nearly overnight success and has become a favorite of mine. I recently got a chance to interview the creator and star, Felicia Day, for a Girls Don’t Game exclusive. Felicia is probably best known for her role as Vi on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but on The Guild she plays a healer with anxiety problems named Codex.

Monique: Anyway, the first question we want to ask is because you talked in another interview about running your alt through Molten Core. Everyone’s wondering exactly how hardcore were you? How geared was your Warlock?

Felicia: My warlock was up to AQ, I had half of 2.5. Our raid did not try Naxxramas until after I left. We had a big defection of people just as we were about to start that set us back, and then the raid kinda fell apart. I still hate those guys I quit in November of last year, but I still pre-ordered a BC collectors edition, it’s in my closet. I can’t bring myself to ebay it. I also had a priest with all Tier 1.

Monique: Sounds like you were pretty hardcore, and definitely addicted. So why do you think WoW is so addicting and successful?

Felicia: There’s a simplicity to the design that is brilliant. It’s appealing to both men and women, the graphics are not too intimidating, and the way they’ve integrated the social aspect of the game is brilliant. The reason why it’s so addictive is that whole idea of “intermittent rewards” where you keep grinding/playing because you’re sure the next kill is going to drop that coveted item you want. Kind of like the lottery or gambling. I think it appeals to all the yummy base human emotions.

Monique: I know some of your actors on The Guild have played other games before, what other video games have you played aside from WoW?

Felicia: What haven’t I played, you mean? I love games. I rolled over an Arcade Tetris game because I wanted a high score in college. FYI, it goes from 999999 to 0. Real bummer. I was a hard core Puzzle Pirate addict a few years back. I could have won an Olympic medal in their navigation game. Great MMO btw.

I actually grew up with computer games. I had an Amiga as a kid, I loved Marble Madness and Faerie Tale Adventure, and before that when I was about six I played Infocom text games. The Ultima games were pretty much my obsession in my early teens. Still the best games ever, and I loved the Star Wars RPGs more recently. Now I’m really involved in my Wii, and looking for other games all the time.

I’ve played pretty much every major single player RPG, I had a big Diablo addiction, I loved all the Sierra adventure games… I need to stop now

Monique: That’s quite the gaming resume. Anyway, you mentioned on your site that some of you work together at an improv theater. Do you ever improv jokes on set of The Guildor do you work strictly to the script?

Felicia: 90% of it was from the script. Zaboo did some improv, adding to lines here and there, and the ending of #3 is his improv. He did like 50 different endings to that episode and had the whole crew in stitches. We have a gag reel in the works while other episodes are in preproduction.

Monique: The Guild deals with a lot of stereotypes from MMORPGs like the neglectful mother and the overzealous guild leader. What was your inspiration behind these two characters in particular?

Felicia: Overzealous guild leader is the #1 cliché of online games I think. It was the easiest character to decide to do, but I wanted to make him very proper, like he was actually in an office, because that idea made me laugh. The only real life basis for that character was one raid leader who I played with who actually fried bacon in the background while he was walking us through the fight. Everything else was fiction.

The neglectful mother was partially inspired by some frustrated mothers of newborns I had played with, trying to find some “me” time through the game. I wanted a mature woman character, and that was the funnest way I could think of doing a character like that, to make her pretty horrible but lovable at the same time. Clara was only meant to have two kids, but the production designer offered his 2 year old for the movie, and I couldn’t resist. Two crying babies is so much more fun than one. Well, in a movie at least.

Monique: While we’re on the topic of stereotypes, has there ever been a time you’ve been discriminated against because of your sex? What do you think of the female gaming culture as a whole?

Felicia: I’ve only found a few groups who were kind of sleazy when I spoke online, and those were generally big macho guilds or pick up groups. The groups I played with had strong women leaders, so there wasn’t anything uncomfortable about the environments. The worst thing was maybe some unwanted flirting, which I deflected with copious “boyfriend” remarks in Guild chat. It really annoys me that the “top” guild in World of Warcraft right now excludes women. I suppose it’s their right, but propagating that idea of gender segregation is bad for gaming in my opinion.

The media thinks of gamers as mostly 14 year old boys, and it’s not true at all. That’s why I wanted to have so many female gamers in my series, because that’s the reality of gaming that I experienced. I also think that “girl gaming” is used patronizingly sometimes. It makes me want to kick people. WoW demonstrates that women like to kill things too, they just like to wear attractive outfits while doing it.

I think that female gaming culture is becoming a bigger force because game makers are realizing that we spend money too. There is a renaissance on the horizon for more story driven, character based games. Hopefully more women will be going into gaming careers and be more involved in game development.

Monique: Well said, Felicia. Lastly, is there anything you want to say before we let you go?

Felicia: I want to thank you for giving me the opportunity to answer such great questions! The internet needs a site like this to discuss women’s gaming issues. Keep up the good work! Also, please subscribe to our YouTube page, so you can be updated when new episodes are posted. Thanks again!

Monique: Thank you so much for this opportunity, Felicia! I know us here at GDG can’t wait for new episodes and it’s been great to find out more about the woman behind this hilarious show, especially your views on video gaming and females. We wish you nothing but success with The Guild.

Also, here’s episode one, for people who haven’t heard of the show yet:

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 13th, 2007 at 10:34 pm and is filed under Video Games, MMORPGs, Interviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.