Five-year-old Sarah Parries would sit on her father Jon?s lap while he played MechWarrior Online, calling out shots and sometimes even taking her turn at the controls while she enjoyed time with her dad.
Sarah loved the ?Jenner,? a very quick mech that she could use to zoom around the battlefield using ?night?vision and lots of medium lasers.?
Early in 2013, Jon contacted the community team for MechWarrior Online to say that Sarah had cancer and if she could get a shout out on the message boards. Unfortunately, by the time they responded, Sarah had already passed away.
Then, in a heartwarming display of a gaming community coming together, the community petitioned the Mech Warrior developers and publisher to start a fundraising drive in her name.
Soon, ?Sarah?s Jenner? was born: A campaign to raise funds for the Canadian Cancer society. Players can buy a custom mech to use in the game for $10 and all of that money would go to the Canadian Cancer Society.
To date, the campaign has raised nearly $80,000. You can read more about the initiative here.
Kelly Zmak, president of Infinite Game Publishing and Bryan Ekman, creative director at developer Piranha Games talked to Post Arcade about the initiative.
Post Arcade: How was Sarah known in the community before the?tragedy?
Bryan Ekman: It was mostly Jon, her dad, who played and she participated as a father-daughter relationship. When Jon played she?d be there offering support and play along with him and she jumped on a few times. It was more about how she liked to watch him play.
Post Arcade: Essentially all of the money collected will be going to the Canadian Cancer society. Was that something that was hard to work out?
Kelly Zmak: We worked out some of the logistics of it and within the group to make sure we had the logistics set up. We wanted the focus to be on Sarah. Sometimes there are question marks on a charity, ?is it really going to be used for what it?s supposed to be used for?? So I think by keeping it simple, and by keeping it really straightforward, I think really helped. We truly felt this was something driven by the community, and something I think the community was looking for us to follow through with in that same sense of honour and respect. I think there is a high level of trust amongst the community for us to handle this well, and we made a commitment to do so. ? Nowhere in this are we planning on making any money.
Post Arcade: You talk about this being a community?initiative, is that something you?ve seen grown out of the Mech Warrior community a lot?
Bryan Ekman:We?ve seen it in different ways. Definitely community support for the game. Trying to build awareness of the game. Build awareness for some of the fan sites. We?ve seen the community rally together on multiple occasions, for different objectives, but this is the first time we?ve really seen them come together for another person. There?ve been obituaries in the past and there?ve been gamers who?ve passed away, but this has been the biggest rallying of our community I?ve ever seen.
Post Arcade: When did you guys find out that she had passed away?
Bryan Ekman: It was in May, Jon had reached out initially to the community team at IGP and said ?Hey could you give us a shout out to Sarah, my daughter who is sick. She has a cancerous tumour.? And by the time that we responded, she had already passed away. It was very, very quick.
Post Arcade: Is there any concern that Sarah?s Mech unbalance the game?
Bryan Ekman: No definitely not. It?s a stock mech with a meta-game boost (an XP-boost allows players to earn experience points a little faster). It?s absolutely just a regular Jenner mech with a custom loadout that anyone could create normally by themselves, however, what?s special about it for the community is the pattern (the skin that sits on top of the mech) and that extra 10% XP boost.
Post Arcade: When you began this whole process, what were your goals for the campaign and the total amount raised (sitting at about $70,000 as of the interview). Did you think you were going to hit your goals? Did you pass them already?
Bryan Ekman: I was personally hoping to hit $10,000. That?s a thousand backers. Yeah, we far exceeded that. Now sky?s the limit. It continues to be successful on a day-to-day basis. I don?t even know where it?s going to end. There are about 20 some-odd days left now. So, I?m looking at $100,000 hoping we?re going to hit that for sure. It would be amazing if we could go further and further. I don?t have a high target at this point. I?m just going to be humbled by what people give to us.
Kelly Zmak: We?ve all just been a little overwhelmed it?s been a very humbling experience.
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