United Videogame Workers-CWA: The New Frontier of Union Rights in Gaming
United Videogame Workers-CWA (CWA Local 9433) is turning a fast-growing, high-profit industry into a new frontier for collective bargaining. In today’s discussion on the America’s Work Force Union Podcast, organizers Vlada Monakhova of Montreal and Anna Webster of Los Angeles described how layoffs, long hours and top-down control are pushing game workers to see themselves as workers — not “creatives” outside the labor movement.
The guests detailed rapid growth since UVW launched in March 2025, including hundreds of members, major shop wins at well-known studios and contract fights over artificial intelligence protections. They also pointed to cross-border lessons from Canada, where labor law can offer stronger protections but still requires workers’ power to enforce them. With Ubisoft workers calling for a mass walkout in February and UVW planning a major presence at the GDC Festival of Gaming, organizers say 2026 could be a defining year for union rights in the video game industry.
Key Takeaways: How Video Game Workers Are Building Power in 2026
- A new labor front is forming: United Videogame Workers-CWA launched in March 2025 and is already approaching 600 members, organizers said.
- Union rights are becoming concrete: Workers are winning contracts that include AI protections and, in some cases, residual rights tied to game releases.
- 2026 flashpoints are emerging: Ubisoft workers called for a mass walkout in February, while UVW plans to organize during the Festival of Gaming.
Union Rights and United Videogame Workers-CWA: A fast-moving organizing drive
The video game industry has long sold itself as a dream job: creative work, cutting-edge technology and cultural influence that rivals film and television.
But for many workers inside studios, the reality is closer to what union organizers have seen in other sectors for generations — instability, intense production schedules and a business model that treats labor as a cost to be minimized.
That is the argument United Videogame Workers-CWA is bringing to the shop floor.
On the America’s Work Force Union Podcast, host Ed “Flash” Ferenc spoke with two leaders in the campaign: Vlada Monakhova, an organizer based in Montreal, and Anna Webster, a Los Angeles-based freelancer who chairs the union’s freelancing committee.
Their case was direct: the industry’s profits and prestige do not insulate workers from exploitation. If anything, the “cool job” narrative has helped employers keep workers fragmented.
The "Art Factory" Reality: Why Game Developers are Rebranding as Workers
Monakhova has been organizing gaming workers for about seven years, she said, after moving from Alberta to Montreal, a Canadian hub for game production.
Her central challenge is cultural, not technical.
Game workers, she said, often support unions in principle but do not see organizing as applicable to them.
“They tend to not see themselves as workers.” —Vlada Monakhova
Monakhova said the industry has benefited from a long-running myth: unions are for factories, not for artists, designers and developers.
She described a shift that happens when workers map their own production pipeline.
The modern game studio, she argued, functions like an “art factory,” where creative labor generates enormous value that workers do not own.
“Your labor and your work is making people an obscene amount of money, and you do not own it.” —Vlada Monakhova
For Monakhova, the point is not rhetorical. It is a strategy lesson.
When workers understand that they are part of an industrial process — with deadlines, management control and monetized output — they can also understand why collective bargaining matters.
Can Freelance Game Developers Join a Union? Understanding UVW-CWA
Webster’s story is common in game development: a career built around freelancing, short-term contracts and constant negotiation.
She said she held one studio job and was laid off.
The experience, she said, pushed her away from traditional employment.
“I was laid off from it. And it was the most dehumanizing experience on the planet.” —Anna Webster
Freelancing, she said, offers autonomy but also forces workers to become their own legal department, marketing team and benefits administrator.
Webster grew up in the Appalachian Mountains, where union history is part of the landscape. Now, she lives in Los Angeles, a union town with established guild systems.
She said it makes little sense that an industry with so much institutional power has so little worker control.
In film and television, guilds can dispatch workers to projects and set baseline standards. In gaming, she said, workers are often left to negotiate on their own.
Recent Milestones: Union Wins at Blizzard, Bethesda and Sega
Ferenc asked whether organizers are breaking through the “you don’t need a union” narrative.
Webster said the answer is yes — and that progress has accelerated in the past year.
United Videogame Workers launched in March 2025, she said, and the union is already approaching 600 members.
She credited the Communications Workers of America's backing as critical to breaking ground in a new industry.
Webster pointed to organizing wins at major studios, including wall-to-wall union shops.
She cited Blizzard Entertainment, Bethesda and Sega as examples of teams that have banded together to demand control over working conditions.
The organizing is not only about wages. It is also about how work is defined.
One of the most urgent contract issues is artificial intelligence, Webster said. She described AI protections as a growing priority because employers can impose top-down directives that change the nature of creative work.
Workers, she argued, should be the ones who decide whether and how AI is used.
Union Rights in Canada vs. the U.S.: Lessons from the Montreal Hub
Ferenc asked Monakhova how organizing looks in Canada, where labor law can be stronger than in the United States.
Monakhova said Quebec has a labor-forward history and legal protections that can shift the balance.
She described one notable feature: when an employer is accused of union busting, the burden can fall heavily on management.
Still, she warned against overreliance on law. She described labor law as a shield, not a sword.
The lesson, she said, is that rights on paper do not replace organizing.
To illustrate what union rights can deliver, she pointed to Vodeo Workers United, a cross-border union effort that organized across the U.S. and Canada.
The studio later closed, she said, and workers lost their jobs — but they secured a contract first.
This week, the game they worked on is being released on Steam, she said, and because of the contract language, workers are receiving residuals from day one.
For organizers, it is a concrete example of what collective bargaining can win in an industry that often treats workers as disposable.
The February Ubisoft Walkout: AI Protections and the Future of Gaming
As the interview closed, Webster flagged a developing story to follow in 2026.
Ubisoft, a French company with studios worldwide, recently shuttered its Halifax studio, which had been the first wall-to-wall union studio in Canada, she said.
Ubisoft also announced cost-cutting measures and canceled multiple games, she added, and in response, workers have called for a mass walkout in February.
The situation underscores a core organizing argument: consolidation and cost-cutting are not abstract business decisions. They are workplace events.
Union Rights and the Festival of Gaming: Organizing where workers gather
Webster also said UVW plans to be present at the event formerly known as the Game Developers Conference, now called the GDC Festival of Gaming.
The union plans to talk with workers and push for industry change.
For organizers, visibility matters. Gaming workers are spread across studios, countries, and contract types.
Building power requires meeting workers where they already are.
The bottom line on Union Rights in gaming
United Videogame Workers-CWA is trying to do in a decade what other industries have built over generations: normalize the idea that creative labor is still labor.
The union’s early wins — from shop organizing to AI protections and residual rights — suggest the industry is no longer immune to collective bargaining.
The next test, organizers said, is scale.
If 2025 was the launch, 2026 may be the year gaming workers decide whether union rights become a permanent feature of the industry.
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