This video game world shows a dystopian future where we fail to stop climate change
Game developer William Volk wants people to put themselves into a situation which "could happen". Image: REUTERS/Benoit Tessier
Get involved with our crowdsourced digital platform to deliver impact at scale
Stay up to date:
Digital Communications
Climate Trail
In the new free-to-play video game “Climate Trail,” developer William Volk imagines an apocalyptic world in which we failed to fight climate change.
The title — available on iOS, Android, macOS and Windows — is a nod towards the iconic educational video game “Oregon Trail,” an iconic simulator of 19th-century pioneer life.
But rather than being set over a hundred years ago, according to Gizmodo, players have to make their way journeying through a bleak, late 21st century landscape. Volk envisions the “climate trail” itself as the only way to survive in a post-climate catastrophe world, leading away from deadly heatwave temperatures in the American South to a much cooler Canada.
“I’m trying to fight the fight by basically putting people in a situation that could happen,” Volk told Gizmodo. “It’s not impossible.”
Surviving Climate Change
Players are led through a series of graphic novel-style scenes exploring what such a world would look like. It sounds bleak: empty stores, heatwaves, and gigantic storms. To survive, you’ll have to buy enough food, collect water, and scavenge in city centers.
Different difficulty modes explore different climate scenarios, ranging from the Earth warming just four degrees Celsius all the way to a deadly six.
While models more often explore scenarios where the Earth warms only two degrees Celsius, the scenarios explored in the game are largely in line with science, according to Gizmodo.
“The catch-22 about this game is I started it with a much more optimistic attitude than when I finished it,” Volk told the site. “The more I dug into it, the more it seemed things were actually worse than imagined.”
Don't miss any update on this topic
Create a free account and access your personalized content collection with our latest publications and analyses.
License and Republishing
World Economic Forum articles may be republished in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Public License, and in accordance with our Terms of Use.
The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.
Related topics:
The Agenda Weekly
A weekly update of the most important issues driving the global agenda
You can unsubscribe at any time using the link in our emails. For more details, review our privacy policy.
More on Climate ActionSee all
Jade Rodysill and Charlie Tan
October 7, 2024
Gill Einhorn
October 3, 2024
Johnny Wood and Madeleine North
October 3, 2024
Mahmoud Mohieldin and Manuela Stefania Fulga
October 3, 2024
David Elliott
October 2, 2024
Tom Crowfoot
October 2, 2024