An Overview of Environmental Themes in the Video Game Industry

e Geographical Bulletin 63(2): 97-108

ISSN 2163-5900 © e Author(s).

INTRODUCTION

e video game industry has a long history of providing

entertainment for users since the Commodore 64 and Atari

systems. Early games such as Pong allowed players to play

virtual table tennis while Space Invaders created a simulation

of an extraterrestrial invasion. Children and adults played

these games despite the claim that gameplay was hazardous

to health and led to addiction (Koop 1982). Furthermore, the

proliferation of video game consoles into the American market

helped trigger the video game recession of 1983, a period of

economic decline that aﬀected both the video game industry

and players (Whitaker 2004). One such iconic representation

of the decline of video game companies was Atari’s burial

of hundreds of thousands of Atari cartridges being buried in

a New Mexico landﬁll (Dvorak 1985; Jary 2011, Kennedy

2011). Next generation consoles, such as the Nintendo Enter-

tainment System (NES), introduced the world to soon-to-be

video game legends Donkey Kong, Super Mario, and Link.

e NES served as a catalyst for the revitalization of the video

game industry (McGill 1988; Consalvo 2006) that had previ-

ously been viewed largely as a passing “fad” (Kent 2001) and

these now classic characters have evolved into popular culture

icons. e success of the NES ushered in the transition from

North American to Japan video game console dominance in

the late-1980s (Katz et al. 1988; Miller 2005).

Before the end of the 1980s, Sega released a new home

console entitled Genesis (or Mega Drive in regions outside

An Overview of Environmental Themes in the Video Game Industry

Michael A. Davis

Department of Geography, Kutztown University of Pennsylvania, Kutztown, PA, USA

email: [email protected]

ABSTRACT

Video games of the early 1990s have an appreciable depth of environmental tones that seem prophetic

by today’s standards as climate change and environmental degradation have emerged as signiﬁcant topics of

scientiﬁc and geographic inquiry. e political and cultural environment of the late 1980s and early 1990s

played a signiﬁcant role in the development of environmentally-minded video games. Since the 20th century,

the depiction of these environmental themes have changed with a greater understanding of environmental sci-

ence literature, have incorporated educational qualities to game play, and have migrated from large video game

developers (e.g., Sega and Nintendo) to independent developers (e.g., Plethora Project and thatgamecompany).

An overview of the evolution of environmental themes in video games is presented by examining individual

games along with trends in the video game industry.

Keywords: climate, environmentalism, video games, geography

the United States) and launched an anti-Nintendo campaign

in order to increase sales (Ken, 2001). is tactic included

the slogan “Sega Does What Nintendon’t” (Sczepaniak 2006).

In response to the Sega Genesis gaining a foothold in the

market (Kent 2001), Nintendo released their new console,

the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) in 1991.

Both 16-bit systems became locked in what would be dubbed

as one of the prominent “console wars” in video game history

(Kent 2001; Harris 2015) as users became embroiled in debate

over which system was the better one to purchase ultimately

ending with the SNES outselling the Sega Genesis (Pachter et

al., 2014). During this period, perhaps unbeknownst to the

general public, environmental tones were beginning to take

root in the video game industry in several of the early Sega

Genesis games. However, in order to understand the advent of

environmentalism in the video game industry, consideration

needs to be given to the political environment at the turn of

the decade.

In the late 1980s, the Cold War was in its ﬁnal stages as

President Ronald Reagan and Soviet Union President Mikhail

Gorbachev brokered peace. is cessation in hostilities could

be considered as the end of what had largely occupied much

of the country’s attention for the previous several decades.

Without the prospect of nuclear annihilation from our former

adversary, one could argue that it created a news vacuum wait-

ing for the next signiﬁcant issue of the day (Koebler 2017).

Media attention began to shift to an emerging scientiﬁc con-

sensus: climate change was occurring. Former NASA-Goddard

Space Center head James Hansen was invited to testify before

a Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources on

June 28, 1988 (Besel 2013) and famously raised the alarm of

anthropogenic climate change by stating:

“Global warming has reached a level such that we can

ascribe with a high degree of conﬁdence a cause and eﬀect

relationship between the greenhouse eﬀect and observed

warming...It is already happening now” (Shabecoﬀ 1988)

and “e greenhouse eﬀect has been detected and it is

changing our climate now...We already reached the point

where the greenhouse eﬀect is important” (Weisskopf

1988).

With the dawning of the 1990s, the Saturday morning tele-

vision airwaves saw the arrival of an animated, environmentally

themed program, Captain Planet and the Planeteers. Within

the context of the cartoon, several young people, named e

Planeteers, from diﬀerent countries and backgrounds were

endowed with elemental powers from Gaia to protect the en-

vironment and summon the titular superhero, Captain Planet.

In the 113 episodes that were produced, Captain Planet would

battle villains with environmentally negative connotative

names, such as Hoggish Greedly and Dr. Blight. e ethnically

diverse Planeteers would assist Captain Planet by using their

elemental powers and raise environmental stewardship around

the globe from their base on Hope Island, a ﬁctional island

that was later revealed in an Ask Me Anything Reddit session

with series producer and environmental activist Barbara Pyle,

to be near the Bahamas (Reddit 2012). e show garnered

positive reviews and Captain Planet became a cultural icon of

the 1990s. In 1991, Barbara Pyle started the Captain Planet

Foundation, where a portion of the merchandise sales from

Captain Planet would go toward empowering young people

and serve as an outlet for schools and non-proﬁts to get seed

money for environmental conservation proposals.

e early 1990s was also a time where Republican leaders

openly spoke on the need for environmental conservation. In

1990, then President George H.W. Bush, in response to the

formation of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

and with his Science Advisor, Dr. D. Allen Bromley, stated at

a press conference at Georgetown University’s Leavey Center:

“We all know that human activities are changing the atmosphere

in unexpected and in unprecedented ways”. Bush nominated

former head of the World Wildlife Fund and environmental-

ist, William Reilly, as head of the Environmental Protection

Agency (EPA). However, after Reilly’s conﬁrmation, other

members of the White House and environmentally inclined

oﬃces favored a development-driven agenda, particularly

John Sununu, Richard Darman, and then-Vice President

Dan Quayle (Dowd 1990; Gelb 1991). Despite these op-

posing views on future progress and conﬂicts (EPA Alumni

Association), George H.W. Bush did propose amendments to

the Clean Air Act to reduce the threat of acid rain, promote

cleaner air in major urban areas, reduce levels of airborne

chemicals, and initially supported a system of cap-and-trade

(Vig and Kraft, 2012).

A climate summit, organized by the United Nations, took

place in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in 1992 entitled the United

Nations Conference on Environment and Development, more

Michael A. Davis

commonly known as the Earth Summit. e goals of this

never-before-seen summit were to scrutinize the pattern of

production of toxic chemicals such as lead in gasoline and

radioactive chemicals, examine alternative sources of energy

instead of fossil fuels, advocate for new public transportation

methods to reduce carbon emissions, and address the growing

usage and supply of water. Unfortunately, the Bush administra-

tion opposed the Earth Summit and lobbied to remove the

legally binding targets of global carbon emissions (Greenhouse

1992).

In the early 1990s, Bill Clinton was elected President of

the United States. His running mate, Al Gore, was a lifelong

environmentalist with a strong track record of climate ad-

vocacy in the Senate with congressional hearings on climate

change (Corn 2006; Aldred and Goodchild 2007) and sought

to create a Global Marshall Plan, in which developed nations

would assist underdeveloped nations economically grow while

protecting the environment (Shabecoﬀ 1990). Clinton would

nominate Carol Browner as head of the Environmental Protec-

tion Agency and Bruce Babbitt as Secretary of the Interior.

With both of Clinton’s nominations, who both possessed well-

established records of environmental conservation conﬁrmed

there was renewed optimism on crafting environmental policy

for the nation. is was furthered by the Clinton adminis-

tration’s creation of the President’s Council on Sustainable

Development, signing the Kyoto Protocol, increasing funding

for the EPA, and protecting the country’s natural resources

such as with the expansion of Everglades National Park.

Imposed on this political backdrop was the competition

for the American market between Sega and Nintendo. With

environmentalism emerging as a more openly discussed issue,

the two companies possessed diﬀerent beliefs on what should,

and should not, be allowed by their game developers. Nintendo

generally restricted their developers from thinking “outside-

the-box” while Sega allowed their developers a greater degree

of creative freedom when designing their new titles (Harris

2015). In a 2015 book entitled e Console Wars, author Blake

Harris described the relationship between Nintendo and Sega

developers as:

Sega very intentionally tried to tap into the cultural zeit-

geist – it pulled from Nickelodeon and MTV and this

new America vibe. If you were a third party developer,

you were beholden to Nintendo, who had total control of

the platform. So if you were an out-of-the-box developer,

you would go to Sega, which was about freedom. With

the blessing of higher-ups within the company, Sega

games crossed into environmental themes more often

than their Nintendo counterparts (Harris, 2015).

Furthermore, Tom Kalinske, former CEO of Sega of America

from 1990-1996, stated:

“For us it was clearly a conscious decision. I always allowed

the development teams to do what they loved to do, to do

what they were passionate about. e guys involved in these

games were very much environmentalists.” (Koebler 2017).

e scope of previous research involving video games has

been broad and diverse in material. Video games have been

concentrated on teaching concepts such as deduction and

hypothesis testing (Salzman et al. 1996; Salzman et al 1999;

An Overview of Environmental emes in the Video Game Industry

Aguilera and Mendiz 2003; Gee 2003; Jenkins et al. 2003;

Klopfer and Yoon 2005; Lunce 2006), complex and abstract

thinking (Aguilera and Mendiz 2003; Gee 2003; Lunce 2006;

Prensky 2006), and visual and spatial processing (Aguilera and

Mediz 2003; Burrow and More 2005). One speciﬁc genre of

video game, the roleplaying games, have the capacity to allow

users to engage in exploratory behavior to determine what

users can and cannot do (Vorderer et al. 2009) and whether

the user must come up with alternative ways of addressing the

challenge (Behr et al. 2003). Furthermore, social communi-

ties within massively multiplayer online roleplaying games

have been studied as a means for cultivating robust online

communities and cultures (Krzywinska 2006; Taylor 2006;

Meadows 2007; Marsh 2010). More recently, augmented real-

ity gaming have immersed the user in an environment that

blends the real-world experience with digitalized layers (Davis

2017; Feldman 2018; Pingel 2018).

Numerous social issues have been linked to the video game

industry. Violence in video games have been extensively associ-

ated with violent or aggressive tendencies in society (Anderson

et al., 2010; McCarthy et al., 2016; Prescott et al., 2018; Kühn

et al., 2019). Political engagement and mobilization from in-

game news have also been studied (Jung 2020). In the wake

of the September 11

terrorist attacks, video games that cen-

tered around the ‘war on terror’ became increasingly popular

(Ouellette, 2009) and living rooms and computer screens now

allowed users to wage war in a comfortable setting (Gregory,

2008). Such transitions in gaming have been examined in a

militaristic sense as well as portraying political architecture,

such as the depiction of imperialism (Shaw, 2010).

More importantly to the motivation of this paper, the cre-

ation of natural conservation tendencies in people have been

studied in a virtual environment through the employment of

Animal Crossing New Horizons (Fisher et al., 2021) despite

users are not actively engaged in the medium they are at-

tempting to conserve (Oswald et al., 2022) and detracting

from positive experiences in nature. Interactions with nature

have been documented to improve well-being and possibly

lead to pro-environmental attitudes and behaviors (Alcock et

al., 2020; Martin et al., 2020). Messaging contained in video

games have also found to have a positive eﬀect on habits of

individuals such as promoting energy eﬃciency (Morganti et

al., 2017) and healthy eating (Chow et al., 2020).

Video games have explored how nature is represented within

gameplay (Wills 2002; Longan 2008) and how the associated

graphics mirror physical geographical landscapes (Ash et al.

2009). e video game itself has the capacity to communicate

how the world is or how it should be (Longan 2008) and

video game experiences provide a better learning environment

than traditional teaching (Garris et al., 2002), speciﬁcally in

conservation education (Tan et al., 2018). Concepts such as

sustainability, food security, and climate change have been

incorporated into multiplayer simulation games dealing with

geographically sensitive issues (Bell-Gawne et al. 2013). is

highlights the importance of this medium in environmental

studies as it has implications in social, behavioral, cultural,

scientiﬁc, and technological realms.

It is the author’s belief that the video game portrayal of

environmentalism and aspects of climate change have never

been discussed in previous academic studies. erefore, the

aim of this paper is to examine of the origins of environ-

mentalism in early mainstream video games and to provide a

detailed account of trends in political and cultural arenas that

have provided a surprisingly robust progression gameplay and

delivery of pro-environmental messages. is paper seeks to

provide a gateway into the evolution of environmental themes

displayed by numerous titles ranging from the early formative

stages of the 16-bit platforms of the early- and mid-1990s to

the sophisticated contemporary games of the early 21

century.

EARLY VIDEO GAME CASES

Games of the 1990s often utilized adventure in the gamer’s

attempt to rejuvenate the ecosystem. Often in these titles, this

was against a main antagonist threatening environmental se-

curity through industrial processes that aimed to contaminate

the environment and perverse nature.

An early example of environmentalism can be found in the

1990 title Growl, developed by the company Taito. Within the

game, the user assumes the role of a forest ranger who protects

wildlife from illegal poachers. However, in a possible nod to

Indiana Jones movies, rangers can be armed with bullwhips

or, in the not-so Indiana Jones sense, a rocket launcher to beat

up the poachers who are driving the animals to extinction.

As levels are progressed through, the rescued animals will oc-

casionally assist the player in dealing with the poachers. Once

the game reaches its ﬁnal level, the boss is revealed to be a

mind-controlling worm. e game closes as the park ranger sets

free all the captive animals in a vibrant display of exotic wildlife

rushing out the large metal doors and back into the wild.

e classic Sega series Sonic the Hedgehog has elements

of environmentalism contained in the 1992 sequel, Sonic 2.

Within the game series, the antagonist, Dr. Ivo Robotnik

(a.k.a. Dr. Eggman), has “roboticized” animals to defend

him from the titular blue hedgehog. In an interview with

isismyjoystick.com in 2010, Sonic e Hedgehog creator

Yuji Naka suggested:

Dr. Robotnik is a slightly radical representation of all

humanity and the impact humanity is having on nature.

In 1991, it was a very sensitive subject to talk about the

environment and while I had my viewpoint, I did not

speak of it. With Sonic, I was given an opportunity to

express my views in a diﬀerent way and did so, showing

Robotnik using pollution and creating machinery which

desecrates the environment and it is down to Sonic to

change his ways (Willmott, 2010).

While the ﬁrst game in the series is devoid of any large-

scale environmental themes, Sonic 2 features levels entitled

the Chemical Plant Zone and Oil Ocean Zone. Discussing the

Chemical Plant Zone, Sonic and his friend Tails must battle

Robotnik in a chemical facility that is ﬁlled with a purple-

colored chemical that will drown the characters if they stay

under too long. At other points of the stage, characters must

avoid blue liquid that jumps between pipes and ﬂows through

a massive network of tubes throughout the stage. When Sonic

and Tails reach the Oil Ocean Zone (Fig. 1), the level is ﬁlled

with a massive ocean of oil while the background contains

the silhouette of an oil reﬁnery. If the characters fall into the

100

oil they will slowly sink and perish unless immediate action

is taken to exit the oil. Adding to this eﬀect, the music has a

Middle Eastern tone to it, a region that was well-known for

oil production in the 1990s and continues to be a large oil

producing region to the present day.

Again in 1992, Sega produced another title Ecco e Dol-

phin. e game starts with the titular dolphin, Ecco, and his

pod attempting to see who can jump the highest in their home

bay. eir game is disrupted by a waterspout that abducts all

marine life in the bay. rough gameplay, it is revealed that

an alien race is unable to grow food and every 500 years the

aliens harvest the Earth’s water. In essence, the aliens can be

viewed as potential ecological terrorists or, perhaps, foolishly

squandering their water potentially similar to humans of the

Earth. Ecco e Dolphin invokes aspects of saving, protecting,

and interacting with marine wildlife during a period of height-

ened environmental awareness. (Parish 2015; Koebler 2017).

A year later, Tengen developed a game entitled Awesome

Possum…Kicks Dr. Machino’s Butt. While not as successful

commercially as Sonic or Ecco, the game is saturated with

environmental themes. e game was marketed as “an excellent

educational game for all ages”, as it proclaims on the game’s

box (Fig. 2). e game can be viewed as prophetic as the

Michael A. Davis

opening slide to gameplay states: In 20 years, mankind has

automated the destruction of the environment (Fig. 3). e

plot of the game involves a mad scientist, Dr. Machino, and

his mechanized army controls the world. e main character

collects recyclable material, such as bottles and cans, while

proceeding through each level. At the end of each level, Pos-

sum goes before a tribunal of endangered animals (Fig. 4) who

ask environmentally based questions pertaining to water usage

and biogeography (Koebler 2017).

Nearing the end of games for the Sega Genesis console, the

game Vectorman was released in 1995. is product of BlueSky

Software places the player in a future where humans have left

Earth seeking colonies on distant worlds and robots are left to

clean up the mountains of garbage that have been left behind

on the humans’ recent home world. Game creator, Rich Karpp,

stated in a 2018 interview to Sega Forever:

I’m happy we used an environmental theme in the story

because it’s easy for everyone to relate to: the cleanliness

of the environment is something that aﬀects everyone and

no one wants the earth to become unlivable. Since we

didn’t have a lot of story setup in the game, it was easy for

us to quickly communicate why there would be an earth

Figure 1. Gameplay from the Oil Ocean Zone in Sonic e

Hedgehog 2. Image courtesy of Sega

Figure 2. Cover art for Awesome Possum... Kicks Dr. Machino’s

Butt. Image courtesy of Tengen

Figure 3. e title slide of Awesome Possum... Kicks Dr.

Machino’s Butt. Image courtesy of Tengen.

Figure 4. End of the level scene in Awesome Possum... Kicks

Dr. Machino’s Butt. Image courtesy of Tengen.

101

with no humans on it. As a kid in the U.S. in the 1970s,

I saw a lot of media imploring people to stop polluting

and to take care of our environment, and I think the

trashed Earth was the logical conclusion of the types of

images we were seeing back then (Sega Forever 2018).

e main character, Vectorman, cleans up the litter and

trash by discharging the rubbish into the Sun all while try-

ing to restore peace from a corrupted robot villain, Warhead,

who encountered a derelict nuclear warhead. e game setting

emphasizes the need to take care of the planet along with

asking what should be done with the world’s refuse? In addi-

tion, illusions to the dangers posed by nuclear energy could

be embodied by Warhead’s ruthless dictatorship over the other

robots left on Earth in 2049.

TURN-OF-THE-CENTURY CASES

During the late-1990s, the nations of the world assembled

in Kyoto, Japan to address the rising carbon dioxide levels and

greenhouse gas emissions that were being released into the atmo-

sphere. is led to the crafting of the Kyoto Protocol in 1997,

which had general widespread support in the global community

(Breidenich et al., 1998). Certain developed countries such as

Australia and the United States did not initially sign the accord.

President George W. Bush was elected in the United States and

campaigned on working toward achieving environmental goals

of his predecessors but, ultimately, failed to keep those environ-

mentally inclined promises (Graham, 2010; Valtin, 2011; Turner

and Eisenberg, 2018). It was around this period, that game

developers began to tinker with negative motives of fanatical

environmentalism in the form of “eco-terrorism”. rough more

violent means, such as package bombings, blockades, arson, or

destruction of property, these groups their messages out to a

wide range of the public to exact their own form of saving the

environment (Nilson and Burke, 2002). By the early 2000s,

the science of climate change had begun to become politicized

(Jacques et al. 2008; Painter and Ashe 2012; Farrell 2016) which

signaled a paradigm shift in gaming.

An example of eco-terrorism is present in Square’s game Final

Fantasy VII. e seventh installment of the popular Final Fantasy

series from Square (now Square Enix) depicts an environmental

terrorist group, AVALANCHE, in a struggle with the Shin-Ra

Corporation, a large corporate interest. e plotline revolves

around the harvesting of energy from the planet and the deterio-

ration of the lifeforce of the planet in the process. Early parts of

the game are bombing missions aimed at destroying the reactors

that harvest this planetary energy (Fig. 5). Shin-Ra has been

viewed as an extension of a privatized government concerned

with defending assets rather than the general population (Lee

2017) and places one of their board members as the city’s ur-

ban developer leading to trash accumulating in overpopulated

suburban ghettos (Lee 2017). During game play, the party of

player characters change from their radical aggression against

Shin-Ra to one of protecting the planetary environment from

being destroyed even as the planet, angry at the inhabitants,

creates vicious monsters that terrorize the landscape in a des-

perate attempt to defend itself. e ﬁnal scene of the game

takes place in the future and depicts the once thriving heavy

industrial capital now in ruins and overgrown with vegetation.

Until this installment, e Final Fantasy series had largely been

rooted among medieval, steampunk, and fantasy themes. e

divergence from this economically highly successful lineage of

video games is noteworthy as Final Fantasy VII became one

of the greatest selling games for the Playstation 1 video game

console (McLaughlin 2007).

Several years later after the release of Final Fantasy VII, the

game developer Konami released the second installment of the

popular Metal Gear Solid series with eco-terrorism at the core of

the game. In Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, a large oﬀshore

oil facility named “e Big Shell” is seized by eco-terrorist group,

e Sons of Liberty, after kidnapping the President of the United

States. In exchange for a massive ransom they will not explode

the facility which would lead to a catastrophic environmental

disaster. While the Deepwater Horizon accident had not yet

occurred, the Exxon Valdez was of the recent history. Players of

the game would have likely remembered the devastation that the

oil had on the marine ecosystem of the northern Paciﬁc. Com-

mentary on the vulnerability of America’s energy infrastructure,

as well as the troubles associated with oﬀ-shore drilling, can be

insinuated from the events of the game.

Satirical games can provide a unique and humorous evalua-

tion of environmentalism. One example includes Pipe Trouble,

a game that allows users to lay down pipeline for oil across a

farmland. Developed by the Canadian company Pop Sandbox,

users face serious complications, such as leaks and spills, to the

comical groups of pixilated protestors and court injunctions

(Fig. 6). e interface of the game splits the screen in two

An Overview of Environmental emes in the Video Game Industry

Figure 5. Mako reactor being bombed in Final Fantasy VII.

Image courtesy of Square Enix.

Figure 6. User interface of Pipe Trouble. Image courtesy of

Pop Sandbox.

102

between a farmer on the left, who wishes you to vacate the

property, and an oil executive on the right demanding you

place additional pipeline. is can be viewed as not only an

angel and a devil on each shoulder telling the user what to do

but also the political boundaries based on North American

stances on climate (the left being environmentally inclined

and the right prioritizing proﬁts over environmental safety).

Radicalization of the pixelated population is also observed

during gameplay as bombings will periodically occur on the

pipeline. Shortly after the game was released, controversy

swirled around the game, particularly in British Columbia

after the 2008-2009 Encana Corporation pipeline bombings

(McGuire 2013). e game was accused of making light of

ecoterrorism (McGuire 2013) and became the target of con-

siderable controversy (Kaszor 2013).

THE INDIE MOVEMENT

With the emergence of independent game developers (Sere-

brin 2017) and the expansion of video gaming experiences

to a multitude of diﬀerent platforms (e.g., computer, mobile

devices) (Dunn 2017), the home video game console of the

late 20

century no longer the primary source of video gaming

experience (Murphy 2016). With the proliferation of indie

game developers, the next generation of games are free to push

to limits of what may have been previously taboo in the video

game industry and are not beholden to large corporations

(MacDonald, 2005; Gnade, 2010). Mobile devices have al-

lowed for further distribution of these types of games (Wright,

2018) and a greater footprint in the gaming universe. Some-

times these games are small budgeted and rely on crowdfund-

ing (Gril, 2008; Gnade, 2010; Parker, 2011; omsen, 2011).

Perceived controversial topics, such as climate change or other

serious environmental issues, had the capability of being the

subject of the gaming experience. is allowed game developers

to not only allow for interactions with the subject but also to

provide an educational opportunity (Darvasi 2014) to the

public as well as to oﬀer a sand box environment to experi-

ment with environmental concepts and oﬀer, perhaps, some

of the most compelling titles as users are completely immersed

in the game and make decisions that city planners, policy

developers, and others make in real-world environments. Like

a child playing in a sand box, sand box gaming refers to the

freedom given to the players to design their own systems and

observe how those constructs interact with external processes.

Additionally, the investment into an on-screen persona, or

avatar, has been linked to increased engagement in the game

environment (Annetta, 2010).

Environmental concepts and climate change have shaped

gameplay in long-running game series, such as Sim City (Chap-

man 2012a), where users assume the role of mayor as they

create their unique city from scratch. Energy sources in the

series range from fossil fuels (i.e., coal) to renewables (i.e.,

wind and solar) to nuclear. Residents of the created city, called

Simians, periodically have environmental concerns ranging

from pollution to land usage. In newer versions of the game,

Simians congregate at town hall carrying picket signs if their

concerns are not being addressed, highlighting grassroots

mobilization to demand action. Maxis, the developer of the

SimCity series, Senior Vice President Lucy Bradshaw said “Be

Michael A. Davis

a polluter and you are ultimately going to aﬀect your friends’

cities” (Chapman 2012b). e Civilization series requires the

user to choose diﬀerent societal breakthroughs that impact

whether a civilization ﬂourishes and falls. In the newest version

of the Civilization series, Civilization 6: e Gathering Storm,

climate change occurs if civilizations employ poor environ-

mental choices. Users can access an interface during gameplay

that tracks the amount of carbon dioxide all civilizations are

producing (Fig. 7). Increased carbon emissions will lead to

melting of polar ice and stronger hurricanes (Bratt 2018a) or

lose coastal areas to ﬂooding or start military conﬂicts over

resources (Byrd 2018). Users can invest in renewables and save

time and money (Bratt 2018a) or forge pacts with other civili-

zations to avert climate disaster (Petura 2018). Lead producer

Dennis Shirk stated “No, I don’t think that’s about making a

political statement. We just like to have our gameplay reﬂect

current science.” (Bratt 2018b). Researchers have shown that

utilizing games like Civilization in the classroom encourages

students to learn about climate change (Squire, 2004) and

there is currently a Civilization game designed exclusively for

the classroom along with lesson plans to accompany the game

(Seppala 2016).

Games that have been created in the early 21

century aug-

ment user experience by adding relevant and accurate scien-

tiﬁc and environmental science to educate the user. In the

game Fate of e World by Red Redemption Games, the user

is engaged in crafting environmental and climate policy to

succeed in one of four designed scenarios (Arnott 2010). Fate

of the World was developed in tandem with Oxford University

climate scientist Myles Allen (Vaughan 2010) and uses current

climate ﬁgures and science to provide for a deep, complex, and

thought-provoking simulation that allow the user to formu-

late strategies to curtail carbon emissions, negotiate political

deals, and ensure geopolitical stability (Fig. 8). Furthermore,

scenarios addressing climate refugees and limited resources

are available as extra downloadable content. Red Redemption

Games chairman Gobian Rowlands stated in a 2010 interview:

Games handle complexity well. Partly because you learn

by doing, but also because of the length of interaction –

you could be playing for up to 50 hours, during which

you learn a huge amount about how a game works. In

an age when we’re accused of dumbing down, computer

Figure 7. Civilization VI carbon tracker menu. Image courtesy

of Sid Meier.

103

An Overview of Environmental emes in the Video Game Industry

games can reverse that trend and help us to smarten up

(Vaughan 2010).

Contemporary games have adopted adventure or roleplay

aspects that allow the user to understand ﬁrst-hand the environ-

mental hardships faced by ecosystems. is can be manifested in

natural phenomenon such as migration. Shelter, a game released

in 2013 by developer Might and Delight, depicts the struggle

to survive when exposed to biological factors or anthropogenic

forces. In Shelter, the user assumes the role of a mother badger

and must relocate her cubs to another den. Each level has a par-

ticular theme that emphasizes the diﬃculty of migration, such

as through predator attacks, nocturnal treks, or wildﬁre. Users

often get vested in the journey and are heartbroken when one of

their cubs is lost (Chambers 2013). As the climate changes and

humanity continues to encroach on the natural environment,

species will likely need to make treacherous journeys like those

depicted within Shelter. e game Rain World by Videocult takes

a similar approach by placing a “slugcat” (Fig. 9) creature in a

world with severe resource scarcity. e backdrop alludes to

possible war or post-apocalyptic future as the slug-cat must

survive by ﬁghting oﬀ monsters using the meager resources at

its disposal. Joar Jakobsson, creator of Rain World, wanted to

emulate the life of “a rat in Manhattan” that understands how to

ﬁnd food, hide, and live in the subway system, but cannot com-

prehend the structural purpose of the subway (Priestman 2017).

Along with his development partner, James Primate, Jakobsson

hoped that players would get that same sense of industrial usage

but not fully comprehend the magnitude of the situation (Cook

2014). Rain World is unique by randomly generating enemies

that also are in search of resources. is element allows enemies

to be viewed as competition in the ecosystem. e developers

of Rain World aimed to have users carefully weigh decisions as

whether to engage enemies over the scarce commodities or avoid

combat and continue foraging (Cook 2014).

e 2007 game Flower, by thatgamecompany, oﬀers a unique

environmental commentary through gameplay. e game begins

with a potted ﬂower on a windowsill within a densely popu-

lated urbanized environment. Petals are transported by the wind

across the diﬀerent landscapes, which eventually becomes more

pastoral as the petals leave the city. As the petals traverse the

topography, color and life are returned to the land and, through

the acquisition of additional petals, expands the scope of inﬂu-

ence by the conglomeration of petals (Fig. 10). e natural

colors and structures create a sharp contrast with the newly-

revived landscape and the dull, gray urban environment. e

relationship between human and nature are explored through

the diﬀerent levels of Flower. e absence of humans in the

ﬁrst few levels shows disconnect between the two and life exists

outside of realm of humanity (Yuen, 2012). is is countered

with the addition of wind turbines dotted across the rolling

hills in another level (Fig. 11). is suggests the emergence

Figure 8. Fate of the World interface. Image courtesy of Red

Redemption Games.

Figure 9. Rain World title slide featuring the catslug creature.

Image courtesy of Videocult.

Figure 10. Scene from Flower as the ﬂower petals move across

the landscape. Image courtesy of thatgamecompany.

Figure 11. Scene from Flower as the ﬂower petals ﬂow around

wind turbines. Image courtesy of thatgamecompany

104

Michael A. Davis

of renewable energies and environmental resurgence as well as

the unity and harmony between manmade structures and the

elegance of nature. Empowerment and activism are suggested in

the game as one petal can transform into a cascading wave of pet-

als capable of changing the landscape for the better. Shattering

the paradigm of items to collect, monsters to ﬁght, or concrete

goals to accomplish, Flower oﬀers a sense of complete freedom

to explore as if the user was physically a leaf petal being car-

ried by the wind. Gameplay may create a sense of introspective

reﬂection as to the users place in the environment and foster a

greater ecological identity (Yuen 2012) while being immersed

in a lifelike landscape and meditatively seductive soundtrack.

Free build games have oﬀered users a new method to compre-

hend environmental issues. ese sandbox games emphasizing

interactivity and experimentation have generated a small, but

passionate, following. Two such examples have been released

in the past three years: Block’hood by Plethora Project and Eco

by Strange Loop Games. Within Block’hood gameplay, blocks

are strategically placed to create neighborhoods (Fig. 12). Each

block has an input and output that will aﬀect adjacent blocks.

Excessive waste can cause bright, vibrant blocks to become dull

and gray resulting in the loss of wildlife and sickness. Jose

Sanchez, designer of Block’hood, stated the game was inspired

by urban farming and the balance of resources versus needs

(Parlock 2017). As of 2017, Plethora Project had only three

employees and the studio aims to present “issues on sustain-

ability and ecology (Parlock 2017). Plethora Project believes

that the game is capable of delivering complex environmental

problems in the form of puzzles that can increase the literacy of

the public to understand larger problems such as climate change

(Parlock 2017). Eco (Fig. 13) has similar gameplay to Minecraft,

a commercially successful constructive game that allows for

collaboration, to promote education of environmental issues.

After a successful Kickstarter campaign, Strange Loop Games

received additional funding from the United States Department

of Education (Parlock 2017) and hopes to enter primary schools.

DISCUSSION

Signiﬁcant environmental overtones have largely emerged in

the past three decades. By allowing game developers freedom to

explore contemporary issues, intriguing and thought provoking

games can be produced. Sega fostered an environment conducive

for the cultivation of these types of games. Unfortunately, many

of them did not garner much commercial success, possibly due

to poor gameplay experience or marketing practices. e players

of these games, however, were exposed to the environmental

movement in the early 1990s. By the turn of the century, the

benevolence of responsible environmental stewardship had

been coupled with ideas of environmental degradation through

corporate greed or acts of terrorism. It was during the early

2000s, that video game developers, particularly the established

giants of the industry, appeared reluctant to continue developing

environmentally-toned games or discussing climate change in

the headwinds of growing climate skepticism. To ﬁll that void,

small independent developers have created games that tend to

highlight the educational aspect of mitigating climate change or

promoting climate resilience and sustainability. With the diver-

sity of environmentally themed games that tackle contemporary

issues and oﬀer potential solutions to remedy these crises, there

appears to be a role for these environmentally centered games in

the future. In response to the Fate of the World, Tom Chatﬁeld,

gaming expert and the author of Fun Inc: Why Games Are the

Century’s Most Serious Business, said: “is could be the

beginning of a ﬂowering of issue-led gaming. But it will be

judged on whether it’s a good game, not on whether it’s worthy

or not.” (Vaughan, 2010).

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

e author would like to thank Caleb Finn and Michael

Oberlander for helping identify video games for this research.

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Figure 13. A scene from the game Eco. Image courtesy of

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Dr. Michael Davis is an Associate Professor in the Depart-

ment of Geography at Kutztown University. He specializes in

atmospheric sciences and how games can be used in geographi-

cal education.