Since 2019, Massive has collaborated with Skåne Stadsmission to support them in their vital work. It’s been a heartwarming collaboration, and has involved financial donations, annual clothing donations, a Christmas gift collection, Massive employees volunteering during the pandemic – to name only a few of our activities.

Most recently, we had the pleasure of welcoming families from Stadsmissionen’s project Unga Forum, to Massive for an unforgettable Holiday event. In their everyday work, Unga Forum is focused on supporting children and teenagers living in social exposure, providing them with a safe space when the world they exist in feels uncertain and harsh.

The event was enabled by the generosity of our co-workers, who could choose to donate their annual holiday gift to charity. Thanks to the donations and with the help from Massive volunteers, who helped during the day, we could open our doors to 41 children and their families during a cold and rainy December afternoon last year.

With the ambition to give the children and their parents a memorable experience, we prepared several activities, food and fika in our Forum, the common area at Massive.

If we can give these children and their parents something to look back on with joy, while giving them a safe space, even just for one day, then we have succeeded.

Upon arrival, the children were welcomed by Santa Claus, who treated them with a sweet and a warm hug, and after enjoying a warm and filling meal from our friends at Yalla Trappan, the children were eager to engage in the different activities. Some got colorful face paintings drawn by our creative volunteers, some decorated gingerbread, made Christmas ornaments, played table tennis, pool, or danced to Just Dance 2023.

To refill energy levels, a well-deserved fika break was needed in between the different adventures. Luckily, there were plenty of delicious lussekatter and gingerbread cookies to indulge in. And if that was not enough, there was a huge basket of fruit, filled with apples, bananas, and pears for the children to enjoy.

Time flies when you are having fun, and eventually it was time to say goodbye. But before our guests left, each family received a gift card for the supermarket Willys, and the children were given a goodie bag filled with toys and filling snacks.

“Engaging in activities like these is a way for us to take responsibility for our local community.” says Camilla Carsten, Event Manager at Massive Entertainment. “We work with Stadsmissionen since we know what a huge difference their work makes to the everyday lives of people”.

During our holiday event, eleven of Santa’s Massive helpers helped make the afternoon a success, assisting in everything from serving food, acting as Santa, drawing face paintings, leading the way in Just Dance, and much more.

“One of the core pillars in our CSR work is ‘involve to impact’. By providing ways for our co-workers to get involved, we want to create meaningful interactions and social exchanges, which we hope are valuable to everyone involved”, Karolina Lundin CSR & Communication Manager at Massive Entertainment says.

“If we can give these children and their parents something to look back on with joy, while giving them a safe space, even just for one day, then we have succeeded. We hope we can inspire others to do the same”.

Later this spring, we will once again open our doors for a similar event. We cannot wait.

Due to GDPR and to respect the integrity of our guests, we cannot share any photos from the actual event.

With another school year coming to an end, kids, and teenagers all over Sweden are leaving for their long-awaited summer holidays. While summer days are the perfect time to spend time in the sun, school break can also be a great opportunity for young people to learn and try something new!

It is always interesting to discover and learn something related to your hobbies and interests. If video games are one of them, why not learn how groundbreaking video games are crafted and explore the magical world of programming?

But how do you introduce kids and teenagers to the video games industry and explain programming in a fun and engaging way? At Massive we came up with the idea of a three-day Coders Camp for young adults.

Future Coders Camp is about creating a fun and safe playground for young people to be themselves and express their creativity.

In July, we launched the Future Coders Camp in collaboration with Spelens Hus and Datatjej. The course was specifically designed for children and young adults aged 9 to 14, helping them learn the basics of coding in a fun and rewarding way.

“Future Coders Camp is about creating a fun and safe playground for young people to be themselves and express their creativity,” David Antell, PR & Communications Manager at Massive Entertainment, says. “We believe that this initiative will inspire the younger generation to discover the magic of coding and help create a more accessible and diverse future for our industry.”

Massive Games Lab is full of energy and inspiration, as the first group of our young guests has just joined our Future Coders Camp. To give every young coder enough time to learn, practice, and explore the creative world behind video games, all students of the Camp were divided into two groups: the first group came to the office in the morning, and the second one in the afternoon.

At the beginning of the Camp, the children had introductory lectures from mentors and our colleagues at Massive to get to know Massive Entertainment and to dive into the endless possibilities of the world of programming.

It was so lovely to see that one kid might be more into the graphics, draw amazing details and really think about how the game looks.

From the basics of coding, to testing game design by creating backgrounds, characters, and different elements, to developing a simple game – the essential part of Future Coders Camp was to give young people hands-on experience and to make the learning process easy and engaging, the creative visual platform Scratch was used. The platform is specifically designed for kids and young adults and has a simple visual interface that makes it easier to grasp basic concepts.

“It was so lovely to see that one kid might be more into the graphics, draw amazing details and really think about how the game looks,” Carolina J. Säll, developer at 46elks and Business Manager at Datatjej, says, “while another kid might be 10 steps ahead in their head, thinking about how level 5 should behave in the game without having even finished level 1 in the code. It reminded me that imagination has no limits – dream big and see what happens!”

Starting from scratch, copying one game in detail, and making it work with their own code, our students quickly became familiar with the principles of programming and began to discover new wonders of code. Inspired by the endless possibilities of programming, our young coders used everything they learned at Future Coders Camp and their boundless imagination to create their own games on the last day of the Camp. Trying, failing, and succeeding in a wonderful creative process – they came up with amazing ideas referencing other games they play themselves.

“One kid shouted at the last session: ‘I love this Camp! When can we take part in it again?’ It felt like the highest praise any coding mentor could ever get, so I would definitely say that many of our students are still deep in code, creating games at home,” Carolina says. “I think that organizing Code Camps like this is crucial for young adults to get inspired, motivated and be able to explore together with other likeminded people, seeing goals that they can aim for and achieve.”

Creating new worlds and gaming experiences is an integral part of Massive, but no less important focus for us is our impact on the world around us. We believe that through initiatives like Future Coders Camp, we can have a positive impact on both the younger generation and the future of the video games industry.

“We are so happy being able to offer this type of activity to children and teenagers in our work to inspire a new generation of developers. If we have encouraged interest and sparked curiosity in one child, we have succeeded.” Karolina Lundin, CSR and Communications Manager at Massive Entertainment, says.

Useful links

• Inspiring a new generation with our Role Model Program.

At the beginning of June, a light breeze and the first summer heat fill every corner of the streets in Malmö. Sunlight is all over the reception at Massive, where the young talents from LBS Kreativa Gymnasiet (LBS Creative High School) are waiting for their first meeting with the video games studio.

Since the beginning of spring, when we launched the Role Model Program, a group of young people from local communities comes to Massive once a month for a guided studio tour and presentation from a Massive Role Model.

“The Role Model program is part of our focus to inspire a new generation of developers and will hopefully have a positive long-term impact on diversity and inclusion in our industry.” Karolina Lundin, CSR and Communications Manager at Massive Entertainment, says.

During the first visit, back in March, young adults from the Save the Children organization came to our office, Eden, to get to know us at Massive Entertainment. As part of the guided studio tour, they visited the Massive Games Labs, our Streaming and Gaming Rooms, and the heart of Eden – the Forum.

“The program inspired our kids. Many of them are interested in video games and they want to become game developers,” Abdulla Taha, Process leader at Save the Children, says.

“I think after the visit our youth will see the video games industry as a place where it’s possible to build a career. A career which is close to their hobbies and interest.”

At Massive we believe in the video games industry as inclusive and open, where everyone who is passionate about video games can find a place to show and develop their talent. As a part of the Role Model Program, we invite our colleagues from different departments and job families at Massive to showcase their profession and the diverse opportunities the industry offers.

“It’s inspiring to have presenters from all disciplines within the studio at Massive present at these events . There are many teams not related to programming or art – which are the most well-known ones – involved in the development of a project. It is great that young adults can see there are so many careers in the industry to choose from!” says Myriam Forbes, Localization Project Manager at Massive Entertainment.

It’s inspiring to have presenters from all disciplines within the studio at Massive present at these events.

In April, when young guests from FC Rosengård came to visit, Myriam shared with them why she loves working in the video games industry, what localization in video games is and how she ended up in the game development company.

The presentation from a Massive Role Model is not only about professional experience. It aims to inspire our visitors, show them how important it is not to be afraid to try different opportunities, not to focus on a single area, and to have many hobbies and interests. While the group of young women from FC Rosengård was surprised to learn that there are specific teams dedicated to the translation and dubbing of a game, they were even more interested in the path Myriam followed to get started in the industry.

“They found it great to meet female role models within this specific industry,” Jessica Stegermaier, Head of the girls’ department at FC Rosengård, says. “The presentation and stories were inspirational and appreciated by everyone. To hear about all the different professions, and the many opportunities no one knew about, even about all the women that hold various positions, helped to catch everyone’s interest.”

We believe that with a program like this, we can give the younger generation a great chance to get to know the video games industry and the people who work to create games we all love playing.

“It changed their perception of the video games industry,” Jenny Sjöstrand, Head of ‘Football for Life’ at FC Rosengård, says. “While most young adults would not have seen themselves in that industry before this program, many of them mentioned afterward that it is an interesting field with a variety of job opportunities worth pursuing. It absolutely opened doors to a field unknown to most visitors and encouraged reflection.”

Useful links

• How our Games Lab helped create the Akribian math app for children.
• A Just Dance off with children and teenagers at Fryshuset.

In 2019, more than 40 Nordic game companies gathered at the annual Bornholm Game Days, during which they all agreed on making the climate issue one of our industry’s top priorities.

The agreement resulted in PlayCreateGreen, an organization initiated by Nordisk Games and led by Svenska Dataspelsbranschen (Swedish Games Industry). The initiative was made possible thanks to the involvement of several Nordic game companies, including Massive Entertainment.

While still in an early phase, the long-term ambition of PlayCreateGreen is to raise climate awareness in the video games industry, reduce negative impact on the environment and to lower our collective carbon footprint. This ambition is made possible thanks to continuous knowledge sharing of best practices between its members.

“Everyone has something to share and something to learn, and by working together we can make real and vital long-term change. We hope PlayCreateGreen can inspire people in our industry to reflect over what we can do to become more sustainable,” Karolina Lundin, CSR & Communications Manager at Massive Entertainment, says.

We hope PlayCreateGreen can inspire people in our industry to reflect over what we can do to become more sustainable.

As of today, the supporter list includes companies such as Nordisk Games (Egmont), Landfall, Embracer Group and Advenimus, and Massive Entertainment, and the hope is for the community to keep growing, inspiring a broader group of companies to implement new sustainable solutions.

We look forward to updating you on our collective work and efforts for a greener industry and planet!

Useful links

• Green initiatives at Massive in our Earth Day article
• Our move to a more sustainable office