Player 2 has entered the game

Women now play, develop, promote and hold top spots in gaming world. See how it's finally levelling the field

-  Noor Anand Chawla

A new level has been unlocked. Across the gaming sphere - from the players to developers and gaming companies - more women are present, visible and killing it. Noisy shooter games? They're right there, wielding the gun. High-speed chases? They're at the wheel. Quick, addictive, match-three puzzles? They're crushing the leaderboard there as well.

The State of India Gaming Report 2022, released this month by Lumikai, a gaming-focused venture capitalist fund, and Amazon Web Services, studied 2,240 smartphone users across India. It found that women spend more time per week playing games: 11.2 hours against the 10.2 hours clocked by men.

The industry is changing too. "It's evolving as women developers, streamers, and gamers gain prominence and respect," says Swayambika Sachar, aka Sway. Sachar captains Top-G, the team that recently won the all-women National Esports Championship organised by the Esports Federation of India.

Mansi Sottany, aka MatkA QueeN, captain of Team Purr-ple and Top-G's competitor says the change is recent. "It has become more inclusive as gaming communities create safe spaces for female gamers and combat online harassment and toxicity. It's an ongoing effort." See who's creating level playing fields and how it affects everything from prize money to the little puzzle in your phone that you can't quite quit.

Top cat: Saloni Pawar, aka Meow16K

Mumbai's Saloni Shirish Pawar, or Meow16k, is 23. She started playing online games 10 years ago. Then one day in 2016, her Wi-Fi service conked off and she tried playing the offline first-person-shooter game, Counter-Strike 1.6. She was hooked.

Coached by her brother and encouraged by friends to create gaming-related content, Pawar is now one of India's foremost Esports athletes and game streamers. She has more than 60k subscribers on her YouTube channel @meow16k.