PBS Wisconsin partners with Menominee community advisors to develop a video game that centers Indigenous voices and culture.

PBS Wisconsin has joined with Nebraska Public Media, Vision Maker Media and a team of Menominee artists, educators, and cultural experts to develop Powwow Bound: A Menominee Homecoming — a story-driven video game that invites players to explore contemporary Menominee life through the lens of the annual contest powwow.

Created for players from middle school to adulthood, the game follows a family living in Chicago as they return to the Menominee Reservation in Wisconsin for the Contest Powwow. Set around the Woodland Bowl, the narrative traces the family’s emotional journey to reconnect with their traditions, language and each other as they prepare for a dance honoring their late grandfather.

Indigenous collaboration at every level

What sets Powwow Bound apart is the project’s deep commitment to cultural authenticity and Indigenous representation. From the start, the game has been guided by an expert team of Menominee advisors, including a writer, concept artist, language and cultural advisors, regalia and dance experts, a beading artist, a woodland floral and appliqué artist, a drum group, and voice actors.

This community-led approach ensures the game doesn’t just tell a story about the Menominee people — it shares a story with them, in their own words, through their own designs and grounded in their own knowledge.

Rendering of Lakelot in the video game Powwow Bound

Jutting out from the picturesque shoreline of Legend Lake, the lake lot has been in the Waqtaenekan family for generations. Not only a great fishing spot, it’s an excellent home base when visiting the powwow.

A new path for representation in games

Indigenous stories are rarely featured in mainstream video games — and when they are, they’re too often shaped by harmful stereotypes or limited cultural input. Powwow Bound aims to change that. The game merges emotional storytelling and gameplay exploration with rich, accurate depictions of Menominee culture, offering players a meaningful and enjoyable experience.

Through this generative collaboration, PBS Wisconsin continues to support inclusive storytelling and community-based production, using new platforms to reflect Wisconsin’s diversity and depth of life.

It’s vitally important for Indigenous voices to be involved in the digital mediascape. Our stories live in the pantheon of all stories but our worldview is novel and has been largely ignored—especially in the bleeding edge world of video games. This game, as with all of our storytelling, is a teaching tool meant to bridge generations and imbue the values and mores cherished by our community.