Gaming Without Guilt: Top 5 Green Games To Play

Did you know that you can choose green games in order to pass the time, without the guilt of supporting violence and destruction? Instead of war, these games promote a greener earth or positive climate change, which can be an amazing way to teach and change the minds of both adults and children. Here are a few games that concentrate on getting people in a “green” state of mind:

Recyclomania – This is a “match 3” type game, like Bejeweled, where you match three similar things to collect points.  In this game, you are matching items to recycle, eventually building your own recycling plants and becoming a recycling master.  This is a great place to start your kids or yourself thinking in a more environmentally friendly way, while playing on the computer.

Garbage Dreams – The Zabbaleen are a people who live in Egypt.  They have become very adept at recycling everything they use and now recycle about 80% of what they consume.  This award-winning game is based on the real-life culture of the Zabbaleen and can be downloaded for free.  Are you up to the task of making Cairo as green as possible?  

Gardenscapes: Mansion Makeover – This is truly a green game, because the object of the game is to build gardens! The premise has the player restoring the gardens of an old mansion by searching through the mansion for hidden items to use in the garden. Gameplay lets you decorate the garden to your tastes and participate in a “Best Garden Contest”.  

Fate of the World – Set in the year 2020, this game exists in a world that ignored the signs of climate change and challenges the player to come up with solutions to problems such as: water shortages, oil crisis, and other shrinking resources.  The data for this game is drawn from NASA, Oxford University, the UN, and other organizations who study climate change. This game is a great place to start kids to thinking about climate change and begin the discussion on how to reverse the changes in the future.

Plan It Green – Plan It Green is a time management game where you are elected mayor of the town of Greenville.  You are handed a barren land and are required to bring the city back to life by creating a greener future.  You achieve this by building eco-friendly houses, upgrading homes with green products, beautifying the city and creating green industry.  Are you up to the task of rebuilding this town with green intentions?  

About the Author:
We at Big Fish love writing and talking about online games because that’s what we do best.  We also like to help green initiatives when we can like here at Life the Green Way. We hope you enjoy these gardening games. If you didn’t know you can download the games for free to play for an hour at Big Fish.

Elena White is the founder and editor of  Life The Green Way, corporate sustainability coordinator at her day job, and a "rurban" wife and mother.  Learn more about her here and follow her on Twitter at @Lifethegreenway.