SERIOUS gaming. No jokes.

The serious game I am choosing to research and write about is called Climate Challenge and is (obviously) about the environment and creating social awareness for tough government decisions that must be made. I couldn’t decide between this game and Energyville but I chose Climate Challenge because it seems more complex, and is aimed at a higher age group 18+ who are eligible for voting! 

Climate Challenge is available on the BBC website under the Science & Nature: Hot Topics link that I have provided above in the hyperlinked game title. I chose this game because I am really interested in the environment, and how our future depends on aggressive environmental policies. Specifically this game provides the ‘public opinion’ on certain policies as well as the environmental, economic, good, water, and energy effects. Clearly people care about the environment, but people also care (maybe too much) about themselves. To radically change/stop global warming this mindset must change also and I think that this game attempts to tackle the stubborn. 

This game was created/developed by Red Redemption LTD and supported by the BBC as well as provided with scientific advice from Oxford University. Red Redemption’s slogan is “Learning by Playing” which I think fits the criteria for a serious games developer. They have won various awards for the development and release of various environmentally aware computer games. They also have a Facebook group!!!! Also also have just become authorized developers for Nintendo DS. 

The game itself is a single-player mode where you are making the choices of the President of Europe. Environmental choices include resident, local, industry, trade, and international and are effected by public opinion/approval, and economic, food, water, energy and pollution goal restrictions. Every few years you meet with delegates from around the world to strategize and help subsidize others for their energy goals while making promises yourself to lower CO2 emissions. You are given ten turns (each turn is a decade) spanning from 2000 to 2100. Every turn you are responsible for choosing a specific number of policies available from the different selections (local, industry, etc.). Hovering over policies shows public opinion (good & bad) as well as it explains the impact of each choice. There are also small bar graphs that visually depict the impact it will have on the economy, food, etc. Its very user friendly but mature and gives very interesting and most importantly necessary and relevant information to the player. This information is not just valuable for the game itself but for understanding real life decisions for environmental policy making. Also, throughout the game there are newspaper articles that show what the public liked/didn’t like and your own approval rate. Some natural disasters occur as well that you must select spending rates for that effect your budget for the following turn.