The Playing for the Planet Awards are officially back. The Alliance is giving a spotlight to outstanding sustainability work from across the video games ecosystem.
Whilst our ultimate goals are the same, organisations focused on sustainability vary massively in how they approach this agenda. And when most mainstream games industry awards only have one sustainability category, it can sometimes feel like comparing apples to oranges.
That's why the Playing for the Planet Awards is celebrating the breadth and diversity of sustainability work in the games industry, focusing on green storytelling, energy efficiency optimisations, and recognising the businesses and individuals that have demonstrated outstanding leadership and contributions to the field.
The Playing for the Planet Awards celebrate work across the video games sustainability landscape, by focusing attention on green storytelling and emissions reduction as well as recognising the studios and individuals that have demonstrated outstanding leadership and contributions to the field.
The available awards are:
Judges: Arnaud Fayolle (Ubisoft Paris), Stefan Werning (Utrecht University) & Joost Vervoort (Utrecht University)
This award celebrates a purpose-driven game that is engaging, impactful and successful in its aims. This award is for games that focus on environmental themes as part of their central narrative or mechanic.
You may submit examples of short-term activations, events or DLC added into an existing game, however these must not have been developed as part of the Green Game Jam.
Judges: Sophie Barteau (Ubisoft Montreal), Demetri Detsaridis (Haveli), Dr Chris Sherwin (Logitech G)
This award celebrates a game that has most effectively integrated energy efficiency optimisations. It recognizes efforts that have led to a positive environmental impact without compromising gamer experience or degrading gameplay fidelity.
We are particularly interested in innovative ideas that save energy, whether on mobile, PC, or console, and reduce emissions upstream so that through these adjustments, there are macro benefits beyond one game.
Judges: Claudia Candidotto (SEGA Europe), Ceri Hutton (Consultant), Kerry Rizzo (Consultant)
This award recognizes the collective efforts of studios in integrating eco-friendly practices, raising environmental awareness, and collaborating with others to inspire positive change within the games community. It celebrates a studio that goes above and beyond on all fronts.
Judges: Jude Ower (Planet Play), Jennifer Estaris (Netflix)
The winners of the 2024 Champion Award will serve as judges for this year’s award, which celebrates an individual who has demonstrated excellent leadership within the games industry on environmental sustainability.
You can nominate yourself, your studio or your game / product -- or you can nominate someone else via our handy Google Form.
All categories are open to any team or individual in the games industry with a relevant project that was released or otherwise completed in 2024 or 2025.
You do not have to be a member of Playing for the Planet in order to apply for these awards.
You may not submit any project that appeared as a finalist in the 2024 Playing for the Planet Awards. You also may not submit any activation that appeared in the Green Game Jam 2024 or 2025.
We welcome applications from all types of games including mobile, PC, console and VR. For each category, we aim to keep the criteria broad enough to encourage a wide range of game teams to apply.
The deadline is Thursday 17th July.
The submission form for the Playing for the Planet Awards contains a number of questions that those applying should submit truthfully to the best of their ability. Judges will mark these questions against the below criteria in a scoresheet which will provide each entrant with an average score.
Judges may also have the opportunity to meet as a group within their categories to discuss the top five entries and choose a winner. However, given the voluntary nature of their position this may not always be feasible.
Since our judges are industry subject matter experts, they can be employed by an organisation that would like to submit for the awards. Whilst we welcome any organisation to submit for the awards even if they employ an individual on our panel of judges, we must note that that particular judge will be exempt from marking the submission of an organisation that they are employed by. In these cases, the average score for this entry will be taken from the other two judges and the third judge will be exempt from any further discussions.
The Playing for the Planet Awards are split into two sections.
The first section recognizes work across the games industry in storytelling, energy efficiency optimizations and tools, as well as the efforts carried out by organisations and individuals alike.
The second section recognizes the work of studios that have participated in the Green Game Jam 2025, an annual project developed by Playing for the Planet in which teams build environmentally themed content into live games with existing audiences. You can find out more about those awards criteria here.
Unfortunately, if the activation has already been a part of the Green Game Jam, it is not eligible for this category. However, you can use your participation in the Green Game Jam as an example of your amazing work in the Champion or Changemaker awards.
It might be! We're looking for games that focus on climate change but also broader environmental themes such as nature and restoration. Games that include narratives about resilience, collaboration and hope as part of their central narrative or mechanic could also be relevant. If you're not sure, feel free to get in touch with louisa.keight@playing4theplanet.org
The winners will be announced in October 2025 at a small ceremony in London. Winners will receive:
Please get in touch with louisa.keight@playing4theplanet.org. Good luck!
