“My favourite is when another Indigenous player or fan will be like ‘Oh yep, she said ‘skoden’ she’s actually Native.’ That made me happy because that was one of my suggestions,” McArthur said. Positive feedback has been coming McArthur’s way on social media, with some fans picking up on a phrase she put in the game. McArthur said this was her first time working on a video game, but she has been bitten by the gaming bug and is looking to be part of more projects like this in the future. Anytime I’m able to learn, or people are interested in hearing it, it means it will keep the language alive longer,” McArthur said. “Language is really important to Nakoda people because we are an endangered dialect, there aren’t a lot of modern, fluent speakers left. Working on Thunderbird was a big learning experience for McArthur, picking up some more of the Nakoda language and learning more about the face tattoos displayed on Thunderbird. “I wasn’t expecting it to be such a global, worldwide reaching game and it makes me really happy to be a part of the narrative that is kind of helping our identity reach the main stage.” McArthur said she was excited to be part of a project where she can play an Indigenous woman in a video game and was thrilled that it was in a game with a large audience. “I was telling my other actress friends ‘oh isn’t this cool? This is how they should handle more auditions for Native people, especially in modern characters.”Īccording to the character’s biography, 36-year-old Specialist Mina “Thunderbird” Sky was born in the Nakoda Territories of Saskatchewan. All they knew was they wanted a First Nations or Indigenous Canadian female in a certain age range,” McArthur said. “Ubisoft had said they were going to base the character, the cultural heritage on the actress that they chose. Saskatchewan and Nakoda actor Sera-Lys McArthur, who portrayed Thunderbird, said the audition was for a Canadian Indigenous woman and the details were sculpted around her own life. She is the first Canadian character added to the game in more than five years. Thunderbird’s release in May was part of the “North Star” season of Siege. Ubisoft recently released a character into its video game Rainbow Six Siege with both Nakoda and Saskatchewan roots - codenamed Thunderbird.
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