Green Media Mediography – Utrecht University

The Circular Maring World

Developed by the Polish educational organisation Fundacja Edukacyjna Nausika as part of the EU Erasmus+ program, The Circular Maring World translates anthropologist Roy Rappaport’s influential ethnographic study Pigs for the...

Rebirth

Rebirth by Reiner Knizia, which won the prestigious Kennerspiel des Jahres award in Germany in 2026, presents an unusual take on the ‘solarpunk’ imaginary and on post-extractive resettlement. The game...

Civilization VII – Earthrise Expansion

The expansion Civilization VII: Earthrise combines solar system exploration with environmental mechanics, which have become increasingly prominent in the franchise since Civilization VI: Gathering Storm. Specifically, the late-game is structured...

Koi

Players create their own Japanese-inspired koi ponds, gradually adding water, shoreline, vegetation, water lilies, koi, lanterns, and other features. Players alternate between acquiring resources and cards and using them to...

Mycelia

Mycelia is a deck-building board game with a natural theme: mushrooms. Each player has their own game board containing 20 dewdrops. You win the game by getting rid of all...

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom is one of the most popular Nintendo game series. You play as Link in the open world of Hyrule and try to...

Netelland

Netelland, created by composer Eva Beunk and installation artist Adrian Gutzelnig in collaboration with the Gaudeamus Festival and Stichting Op Wacht, is an immersive, site-specific performance set in the speculative...

Spirit Island

Spirit Island is widely recognized not just as a well designed cooperative strategy game but as a deliberate counter-narrative to the neo-colonial exploration and exploitation gameplay inherent in classic games...

Hero of the Kingdom (series)

While not explicitly framed as an ‘ecogame’, the Hero of the Kingdom series (developed by Lonely Troops) offers an interesting and sometimes surprising representation of human-nature relations in a fantastical...

Werewolf: The Apocalypse – Heart of the Forest

Released in 2020 by the Polish indie studio Different Tales (co-founded by former The Witcher designers), Werewolf: The Apocalypse – Heart of the Forest is a narrative-driven visual novel RPG....

Blue Planet (TTRPG series)

Originally published in 1997 by Biohazard Games and recently revived with Blue Planet: Recontact, Blue Planet is widely considered a pioneering and successful example of ‘hard’ eco-science fiction in the...

Eco Lifestyle Careers and NPCs (The Sims 4)

In the base game of The Sims 4 withe the Eco Lifestyle expansion, the environmental systems sometimes feel more like a top-down macro-level simulation. The ecological footprint meter and regulatory...

Laundry Day (The Sims 4)

The Sims 4: Laundry Day Stuff pack emerged out of a community vote originally pitched under the working title “Eco Living”. While the more systemic, macro-level mechanics like politics (e.g....

Global Warming (Factorio)

The Factorio base game already tentatively addresses ecological impact. By default, it treats environmental degradation as a localized trigger for hostile environmental reactions, i.e. if players pollute, trees absorb the...

The Edge of Water

BigMood’s indie adventure The Edge of Water avoids mechanics of environmental exploitation for gameplay systems built around stewardship, multi-species kinship, and ecological harmony. The game works most visibly by defamiliarizing...

Machine Dreams: Rainforest

Refik Anadol’s Machine Dreams: Rainforest, the headlining debut exhibition at Anadol’s Los Angeles museum Dataland, is a highly ambitious attempt at using AI and immersive projection techniques in the service...

Climate Cooldown

Climate Cooldown is a cooperative educational board game designed for 2–4 players (though the game is scalable for larger groups in classrooms). Over the course of up to five rounds,...

Post Growth Toolkit: The Game

Developed by the art and research collective Disnovation.org, Post Growth Toolkit: The Game is a tactical intervention into how we conceptualize the climate crisis. Most commercial environmental simulation games like...

Thrifty Business

Thrifty Business by Spellgarden Games is not explicitly framed as an ‘ecogame’ – neither by players nor the developers – but it has some interesting characteristics for climate communication and...

Heatwave

HeatWave by Perimeter Games, already announced in 2020 and potentially in development limbo, is a non-linear sandbox guerrilla group simulator that frames global temperatur escalation not just as an environmental...

Silt

While often categorized by players primarily within the horror genre, the indie game Silt foregrounds environment and ecological systems as central components of its gameplay. Rather than treating the setting...

Plastic Island

Plastic Island, developed by the Indonesia-based “Ecogames” collective, is an educational board game that thematizes combating plastic pollution. Participants clean and upcycle trash, enhancing the ocean’s health; the game (like...

Mulaka

Developed by the Mexican studio Lienzo, Mulaka is a 3D action-adventure game that focuses on Indigenous storytelling. Set in a poly-poly rendition of the landscapes of northern Mexico, the game...

Future Energy

Future Energy, designed by Emanuele Ornella and published by Queen Games, is officially part of Queen Games’ Green Planet series, a line of games explicitly dedicated to themes of sustainability...