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• 1 2023-12-08T00:04:32+00:00 The Climate Game: Can You Reach Net Zero? 10 plain 2023-12-09T01:43:55+00:00 A key element of this game's message is the idea of decisions and trade-offs. The player wants to make decisions that have the best impact on the environment, but this is actually not as easy as it sounds because the game is structured in a way that every action requires "effort points" -- more drastic require more "effort points", as seen in the image below. 
  
  Although it is clear that the second option -- immediately closing all coal plants and beginning the construction of clean energy plants -- would be the most significant in terms of CO2 reduction, this option also takes much more effort points. Once the player runs out of effort points they are rendered unable to take any actions or responses. The other two options are less effective at reducing CO2 but take fewer effort points. This game's core concept is tied to the idea of agency. In the book Hamlet on the Holodeck, author Janet Murray discusses the idea of agency in a video game. She writes "agency is the satisfying power to take meaningful action and see the results of our decisions and choices"(Murray 126). The idea of meaningful action and results is very important to a satisfying game. In this game, the player's choices are absolute and really do shape the course of the environment as the years pass. Further, as Murray says, the game allows players to see the results of their actions -- most of the time, almost instantly. The game's objective is to reduce the numerical CO2 value as much as possible. Every time the player makes a choice(excluding the investment choices), the impact of that choice on the CO2 value is displayed immediately along with an explanation of what the player achieved (or failed to achieve) showing the player that their choices have real meaning and value in determining the future of the environment. Giving players this agency makes them focus more on the environment-saving options being presented and think more deeply about how each policy could shape the environment.