Chick-fil-A - yes, that Chick-fil-A - is looking for someone to help make board games
The chicken slinger anti-equal rights funder is on the hunt for the next Sneak King.
Chick-fil-A, wildly popular distributor of chicken sandwiches and anti-LGBTQ rhetoric, is hunting for someone to produce games for the company. Video games, sure, but a recent job listing also lists board and card games among the “original games from Chick-Fil-A”.
Whoever eventually fills the seat of Gaming Producer within the US fast food chain will be charged with “overseeing the day-to-day creative exploration, development, and production” of “console, mobile games, "free to play" games, or other digital activities-as well as analog games, including board games, card games, and other family and group activities,” according to the listing found on The Muse’s digital job board.
Looking deeper into the job description reveals some unsettling clues as to what a Chick-fil-A branded game entails. Specifically, the eventual video or analogue game must “match the vision, heartbeat and positioning of the Chick-fil-A brand” and “be carefully and thoughtfully brought to life in such a way that audiences both internal and external can quickly say, 'that feels like Chick-fil-A'”.
What exactly feels like Chick-fil-A? For many customers it's a simple chicken sandwich or waffle fries dipped in its famous sauce (which is just a mixture of three staple southern US condiments: honey mustard, barbecue, and ranch dressing). For others, it’s the companies well-documented history of donating to anti-LGBT organisations and hateful comments from former CEO and current chairman Dan T. Cathy.
Cathy made headlines in 2012 when he vocally opposed same-sex marriage legislation, saying at the time that “we are inviting God's judgment on our nation.” Cathy’s father, S. Truitt Cathy, was a devout southern Baptist and inscribed many of his Christian values into the company, most notably closing the stores on Sunday. The Cathy family has donated millions to anti-LGBTQ groups in the US through the WinShape Foundation, many of which support conversion therapy and others that are listed as hate groups by the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Chick-Fil-A spent much of the 2010s and 2020s distancing itself from these groups and removing them from their tax records. Cathy is still actively involved with several conservative groups seeking to dismantle the US Equality Act. Despite this, Chick-fil-A remains one of the most popular fast food restaurants in the nation and now wants to spread its image laundering into family-friendly games.
The chicken slinging chain will be late to the game if one of its “engaging four-quadrant family entertainment” products ever make it to market. Wendy’s produced a 100-page tabletop RPG book titled Feast of Legends in 2019 that allowed groups to use a simplified version of Dungeons & Dragons’ 5E rules to duke it out against a genercised Ronald McDonald. Opposing chicken shop KFC developed a dating simulator called I Love You Colonel Sanders! A Finger Lickin' Good Dating Simulator in 2019, one year before the same company said it would produce a gaming console that funnelled all that heat into a built-in chicken warmer compartment (we’re still waiting for this modern marvel to materialise).
There’s no telling what, if anything, will come of Chick-fil-A’s toe-dipping into game production. The role mentions reviewing pitches from developers and designers, as well as managing partnered companies, so don’t expect its Atlanta, Georgia headquarters to suddenly open a fully staffed studio.