Celebrating the LGBTQ+ Community

We are celebrating Pride Month globally to emphasize the importance of community and strength in unity. Through this year’s theme, Coming Together: Strength in Community, we are creating space for powerful conversations and programming that honors our people, leaders, champions, and allies across the LGBTQ+ community.

Inside EA’s Walls 

Our people fuel our workplace culture and we prioritize building an environment where every employee is treated equally and welcomed to be their authentic selves. 

Our Pride ERG has built a strong support and advocacy network to push for change wherever it’s needed. 

This year we saw Apex Legends™ pick up an award for Outstanding Video Game at the 2023 GLAAD (Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation) Media Awards. Apex Legends is a great example of a team with diverse backgrounds and lived experiences infusing those experiences into our characters to make a game reflective of a modern global community.

Leslie Heryford, Sr. Director, Experience Integration and Global Chair of Pride took us down memory lane, reminding us how important representation is and how LGBTQ+ support needs to be in the makeup of everything we do.

Leslie Heryford

For me, EA’s history of support and representation of the LGBTQ+ community is core to my belief in the positive impact we have on the LGBTQ+ and gaming communities. EA’s support goes back decades before the significance of inclusion and representation was an established norm. From the late 1990’s when a live demo of The Sims included a same-sex kiss, to Dragon Age’s first trans character, Krem, to the current Apex cast, EA has always been committed to diversity and compelling characters. Our games create spaces where everyone is represented and welcomed. This is part of the core of EA and carries over to our company culture.

EA believes that creativity and passion are unlocked when people can be themselves. This is not part of a corporate fad or the result of increased industry awareness, but a manifestation of EA’s commitment to its values. I am proud of the positive examples of LGBTQ+ representation we have in our games and how we strive to create authentic spaces for our community. Creating places where everyone can be seen and heard in safe spaces is core to what we do. Our values are why we do it.

We’ve only just scratched the surface of what’s possible for LGBTQ+ representation in our games. Our investments in diversity, equity, and inclusion are because we want to empower our people. By celebrating diversity and actively fostering inclusion, we will also shape the future of Electronic Arts along the way—IRL and in-game.