WORDS BY NEIL PARMAR

As the gaming world diversifies the narratives and stories being told, WEIRDO writer Neil Parmar shares his thoughts on the rise of South Asian diaspora gaming narratives in games like Venba and Thirsty Suitors.

Throughout my years of gaming, few instances have matched the emotional weight of the moment a pivotal character met an unexpected demise roughly one-third into playing the original Final Fantasy 7. As an unsuspecting 11-year-old, this was a big deal –  my gaming experiences up until then were largely centred around speeding through levels as a blue hedgehog and engaging in top-down-view ice hockey matches. That changed when I experienced Venba in late 2023.

Venba follows the story of Venba and her husband Paavalan, who leave Tamil Nadu to begin a new life in Toronto, Canada. Players play through the narrative of Venba as she navigates life in Canada whilst grappling with the complexities of adaptation, cultural integration, and family dynamics. The game is heavily inspired by Tamil culture and incorporates the language, as well as being inspired by South Indian cuisine.

I've already revealed the loose details of a significant plot twist from Final Fantasy 7, so I'll refrain from spoiling Venba.  Beyond its narrative and South Asian protagonist, Venba represents a game with the potential to engage non-traditional gaming demographics. It incorporates simple gameplay that revolves around cooking traditional Indian dishes like idlis, biriyani, and dosas, each meal serving as a narrative anchor for the chapter at hand.

Similarly, Thirsty Suitors, which also came out in 2023, follows protagonist Jala, a fiery young South Asian-American bisexual skater, as she navigates a complex web of personal challenges, including fending off exes, managing familial expectations surrounding her sister's wedding, and grappling with pressure from her grandmother to “settle down”. The suitors her grandmother sends are hilariously mismatched for Jala, which results in some of the game’s funniest moments. Alongside the humour, there’s a poignant exploration of the South Asian child-of-immigrants experience, that explores some specific experiences of alternative South Asian people that I’m yet to see explored by TV and Film.

While South Asian diaspora narratives are rare in video games, sporadic appearances of South Asian characters have occurred over time. One of the most notable is Dhalsim from the Street Fighter series, known for his limb-stretching abilities and his “Yoga fire!” fire-breathing attacks. Not as cool was Taj, an elephant character with a questionable Indian accent in 1997's Diddy Kong Racing on the N64, later altered to a more neutral accent for the Nintendo DS remake. Characters like Symmetra from Overwatch and Great Tiger from 1984's 'Punch Out!!' on the NES also deserve a mention, though the term "character" may be loosely applied here for all the above cases. On the other hand, 2023’s Stray Gods introduces Farishta Bandi, also known as Freddie, as the protagonist's best friend – a fully developed South Asian character who adds depth to the narrative and is proficient in Hindi, if required.

So, why has it taken so long to see fully developed characters like Thirsty Suitors’ Jala, Stray Gods’ Freddie, and Venba? And what’s caused the shift in developers to – finally – explore South Asian narratives with female protagonists? Especially when  gaming is traditionally perceived as a male-dominated hobby. Bhavna Patel, a longtime  gamer from the West Midlands says, "If you're developing a game with a South Asian narrative, continuing with the male-centric storyline would feel stale. If you aim to represent South Asians in gaming, it makes sense to amplify the voices of segments of society that are often overlooked." Bhavna's observation also echoes trends in Bollywood narratives. While diaspora cinema and Indian independent cinema excel in showcasing women's perspectives, Bollywood often falls short in this regard. "Very few Bollywood films focus solely on women and their stories, yet they all have female characters. There's always the male hero and the woman he's in love with, but they're always told from the perspective of a man."

As gaming continues to diversify, the emergence of much-needed protagonists like Jala was only a matter of time. The outdated stereotype of gamers as predominantly sedentary isolated beings is evolving, and there’s a wealth of games out there that provide something completely different to what games like Fortnite and Call of Duty have to offer. In my conversation with Bhavna, she pointed out that developers are recognising the presence of female gamers and gamers from a wide diverse range of backgrounds, and developers are tailoring games to cater to this audience. It’s also important to note the success of Venba which was nominated for Best Indie Debut Game at The Game Awards 2023, and Thirsty Suitors securing the Tribeca Games Award in 2022. Both games have also been lauded by various outlets for their innovative approaches to the stories they tell.

Food is a central theme in the lives of most children of immigrants (myself included). It’s therefore fitting that it plays a role in both Venba and Thirsty Suitors. So with all that in mind, here's my idea for a game, if any developers are reading this. How about a game that combines the frenetic culinary chaos of Overcooked with the storytelling style of Venba? Players collaborate to manage a South Asian restaurant, starting from their humble beginnings, learning to roll out chapati’s in their home kitchen, to eventually working their way through various levels of difficulty to eventually run a stellar South Asian street food eatery, all whilst navigating through increasingly impatient customers, and reducing as many “I can do this better at home”-esq comments from aunties.

As I mull over a fitting name for this concept, there’s no doubt that it is becoming increasingly clear that the integration of South Asian narratives and characters in gaming is becoming more tangible, and there certainly are  a plethora of stories to tell.

About Neil

Neil Parmar is a West Midlands-based media producer and has produced a variety of short films, documentaries and podcasts that have explored alternative culture. He is a writer for WEIRDO’s website and editor of ‘We Are The Weirdos, Aunty-ji’ podcast. In his downtime, Neil enjoys photography, live music and being a cinephile.