Genre Inversion
This pattern involves taking an existing (sub)genre, ideally one clearly associated with anti-ecological modes of thinking, and trying to ‘invert’ the basic gameplay or at least change/remove a constitutive element. A well-known example is the ‘reverse citybuilder’ gameplay in games like Terra Nil, but this could be adapted to other genres as well, particularly in the indie space, where this would similarly create familiarity and a recognizable ‘hook’ that may help a game stand out.
A design challenge will be to quantify and abstract characteristic like (in the case of reverse citybuilders) ‘restoration’ to make it operationalizable in gameplay?