Just weeks after Shero Comics celebrated its seven-year anniversary of publishing comic books with women and girls of color as powerful protagonists, the company is set to debut its brand-new gaming division, Shero Games, at the Jrue & Lauren Holiday Social Impact Fund’s Dual-Court Classic on August 5th, 2023, in Los Angeles.
Despite women making up 48% of all gamers, less than 6% of games feature a female protagonist. With a wealth of Black female-led comic book IPs like Rayven Choi, Squad Goals, The Legend of Cahokia, and Young Grandmaster Choi to pull from, Shero Games plans to bridge this gap by building a series of mobile, PC, and Roblox games that feature women and girls of color as the main protagonists.
Since launching on July 19, 2016, just before that year’s annual San Diego Comic Con, Shero Comics has caught the eye of readers, publishers, developers, and most recently, philanthropists.
“Though I’ve been a gamer my whole life, it wasn’t until I exhibited at my first comic con in 2016 when a developer approached me about turning Rayven Choi into a video game that the idea of building games landed on my radar,” said Shequeta L. Smith, award-winning writer and founder of Shero Comics. “Now with several more IPs under my belt, I think it’s the perfect time to make video games with Sheroes at the epicenter.”
In 2022, a small grant from digitalundivided powered by JP Morgan Chase made it possible to build the prototype for Shero Games’ first mobile gaming app. In 2023, the company was also chosen for two highly selective philanthropic programs to support the upcoming launch: Goldman Sachs’s One Million Black Women: Black in Business spring cohort, and the Jrue & Lauren Holiday Social Impact (JLH) Fund, which had over 1800 submissions.
Shero Games will launch with “Rayven Choi: Reaper’s Run,” a Subway Surfers-style mobile game based on the award-winning graphic novel Rayven Choi. The game features the iconic protagonist Rayven running from a Reaper, a formidable hitman, through a visually stunning interpretation of ancient Korea.
In addition to matching what Shero Games raises this October on the Fund Black Founders platform, the JLH Fund — founded by Olympians and recipients of the 2023 Muhammad Ali Sports Humanitarian ESPY Award, Jrue and Lauren Holiday — is also hosting the company’s soft launch during their upcoming August 5th Dual-Court Classic, a celebrity basketball and soccer tournament that aims to elevate Black founders for Black Business & Philanthropy Month. Attendees will be the very first audience to get an early look at the game, as well as the chance to play it on-site.
Rayven Choi: Reaper’s Run will be available to download on the Apple App Store and Google Play Store in the first quarter of 2024. To learn more about Shero Comics and Shero Games, please visit www.sherocomics.com
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