This text examines how a game culture strategy can support and promote Sámi game culture. A game culture strategy plays a key role in advancing diversity and inclusion, and it is essential that the specific needs of the Sámi people are considered.
Most existing Sámi games have been developed for educational purposes. In Finland, three Sámi languages are spoken, each of which is endangered. Games play a significant role in language revitalization, and the number of game projects is increasing. For example, the Lohkanlihkku project, run by the University of Lapland, Umeå University, the University of Jyväskylä and the Sámi University of Applied Sciences, is developing a Sámi-language version of the reading game Lukukupla, based on Ekapeli, in five Sámi languages.
The emphasis on education in Sámi games is no coincidence. The Sámi have been subjected to assimilation policies that have affected their culture. Attempts have even been made to eliminate games: for instance, the Sáhkku board game was banned by the church as “the devil’s game” because it was seen as containing pre-Christian nature worship (Borvo 2001). Prohibiting the game was therefore an attempt to prohibit Sámi identity itself.
Today, games also serve to connect Sámi communities digitally. Open-world games such as SecondLife and Minecraft provide arenas for language revitalization without the need to build a game or a platform from scratch. Minecraft was translated into North Sámi by a volunteer in 2020, and since then there have been game streams in North Sámi as well as a rise in Minecraft clubs. The activities often transcend borders: for example, the Deanuleagis sámástit project organised a North Sámi Minecraft club that brought together Sámi children and young people from the Teno Valley in both Finland and Norway. The gaming communities connect, for instance, through Discord or IP calls. Minecraft also includes a virtual version of the Norwegian Sámi Parliament, developed as a learning environment in collaboration between the University of Agder and Sámi Allaskuvla.
Sámi gaming has a strong international reputation among Indigenous game developers. Video games developed by Indigenous peoples have been on the rise globally for some time. In the commercial sector, Skábma – Snowfall (Red Stage Entertainment) was awarded the prize for Best Nordic Game at the Nordic Game Awards in 2022. The noaidi girl Raana, developed by Miksapix Interactive and Red Stage, has already appeared in seven episodes on mobile platforms.
What should a game culture strategy consider regarding the Sámi?
The strategy should start by recognizing the existence of Sámi culture and promote the use and visibility of Sámi languages. At the same time as the role of games within Sámi communities is being redefined, society is debating restrictions on the use of digital devices. There is a risk of history repeating itself: as online gaming platforms are increasingly used as tools for language revitalization, restrictions may also impact Sámi people’s right to their own language, culture, and sense of belonging to their community.
Developing games is an act of preserving cultural heritage, but the preservation of the games themselves must also be addressed in the game culture strategy. The European Citizens’ Initiative Stop Destroying Videogames has highlighted the issue of digital game preservation. The link between Sámi games and language revitalization adds a new dimension to this. Finland ratified UNESCO’s Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2013, and its implementation is overseen by the Finnish Heritage Agency. The first Sámi-language games and dictionaries were developed as early as the 1980s, but they were never documented. The digital heritage and tacit knowledge of Sámi culture are at risk of disappearing.
A game culture strategy can support the Sámi community’s participation in the game industry. This requires providing resources and support so that, for example, gaming hobbies are accessible to Sámi people regardless of where they live. In addition to online activities, local game initiatives strengthen regional vitality and create pathways into the games industry. The games industry is a significant corporate taxpayer in Finland, and Neogames’ 2025 municipal election programme aimed to multiply tax revenues by 2030. Achieving this goal requires developing regional activities. The northernmost municipalities have already seen game development initiatives, such as the Saami Game Jam, but continuity is limited by fragmented project funding and the lack of a joint Nordic funding channel.
The rise of artificial intelligence is transformative, but minority languages still have limited agency within this development. This directly affects game development: for example, the lack of speech recognition technology restricts the creation of augmented reality games, even though such games would be highly valuable for both language revitalization and learning. There is both a need and a clear interest in developing AR and VR games in Sámi languages, but the technological infrastructure is not yet sufficient. Developing speech recognition requires large amounts of spoken and written language data, which endangered languages have very little of. The archives of the Art and Culture Agency have been used to train speech recognition tools in a joint project between Aalto University and the University of Lapland, but the work is still at an early stage. A game culture strategy can therefore set goals that strengthen the technological infrastructure of Sámi languages.
Finally, the game culture strategy should promote fair play that respects different people and cultures. It is essential to ensure that the Sámi themselves can define the relationship between Sámi culture and games.
Text: Senior Advisor PhD Outi Laiti, Art and Culture Agency
Image: Lost Memories VR, Horatiu Roman, Milan Grajetzki, Shailesh Prabhu, Julia Rässa, Mikael Latva ja Outi Laiti
References:
Borvo, Alan (2001), “Sáhkku, The “Devil’s Game”” (PDF), Board Games Studies, vol. 4, Leiden: CNWS Publications, pp. 33–52, ISBN 90-5789-075-5, ISSN 1566-1962
Harrer, S., & Custódio, L. (2022). Fair Play: Confronting Racism and Coloniality in Games: A Media Education Handbook.
Laiti, O. (2021). Old ways of knowing, new ways of playing—The potential of collaborative game design to empower Indigenous Sámi.
Neogames. 2025. Suomen pelialan kuntavaaliohjelma [Finnish Game Industry Municipal Election Programme]. Retrieved June 16, 2025, from https://neogames.fi/fi/suomen-pelialan-kuntavaaliohjelma-2025/
Shah, M., Paananen, S., & Laiti, O. (2024). Minecraft: Indigenous Communities. In Learning, Education, & Games: Volume 4: 50 Games to Use for Inclusion, Equity, and Justice (pp. 125-134). ETC Press.
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