Playing for the Planet Publishes New Research Exploring How to Design Environmental Content for Impact

Over the last nine months, researchers from the University of Edinburgh have been working with teams at Sybo, Trailmix, and Wooga to survey some 58,000 players in exploring the effectiveness of in-game content for encouraging pro-environmental behaviour. 

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The findings from this research have now been published, and you can download your copy here.

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The research builds off the work of our 2022 Player Survey from that year's Green Game Jam, which first highlighted the positive appetite from players for environmental content in games, and has since helped to demonstrate the business case for studios to engage their communities on this agenda. 

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In examining the impact and effectiveness of these studios’ in-game activations, the research team has identified four key learnings to help others across the industry improve the effectiveness of their environmental content:

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• Know your audience and the behaviour that you're targeting: Take time to understand both your player base and the specific behaviour you would like them to take in regards to the environment to ensure you develop green activations capable of delivering outcomes from the outset.

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• Fixing the solutions gap: Players know a lot more about the causes of climate change than they do about the solutions to climate change, presenting an opportunity for your game to help players turn existing knowledge into practical action. 

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• Rinse and repeat: Repetition through activations with multiple touch points pays off, resulting in small shifts in terms of players’ knowledge of climate issues and perceived capability to deal with them accumulating over time. For example, Love & Pies activation for the 2024 Green Game Jam showed that players who completed an average of 20 milestones demonstrated meaningful shifts in the climate behaviours the game sought to push. 

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• Resistance isn’t futile: Games are built with flow in mind, but flow state often makes it hard to assimilate new knowledge. By implementing moments of relevant resistance in the game with care (i.e. within an appropriate gameplay-related moment), players are given more opportunity to engage, learn, and act.

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The outcomes of this research not only reinforce the potential for games to serve as powerful tools for driving pro-environmental behaviour, but can encourage and equip studios across the industry to take further action on this agenda. Furthermore, Playing for the Planet is committed to continuing to enrich the evidence base that can help industry stakeholders make the case for engaging players on the environment through their games, with this report marking just another step in that effort to expand the industry’s collective knowledge pool. 

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By understanding your audiences, closing the climate solutions gap, reinforcing messages through repetition, and introducing these at the right time in the right place, developers can create compelling experiences that resonate beyond the screen. The path forward is clear: by aligning great gameplay with environmental impact, studios have a powerful opportunity to shape a more sustainable future - one player at a time.

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Playing for the Planet, launched during the 2019 environmental conference in New York, is facilitated by the United Nations Environment Programme. It was founded to encourage the video game industry to reduce their emissions and to help inspire gamers to develop sustainability awareness and commit to climate action.

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