The key objective was to develop and disseminate flagship didactic resources that explore the intersections of gaming and environmental sustainability. These resources were designed to empower students with knowledge and skills to reduce environmental impacts through innovative game design, greener workflows, and sustainable production practices. The project sought to achieve several specific goals: - Raise awareness among students about the ecological dimensions of gaming, enabling them to critically assess and address industry challenges. - Foster research interest in sustainable gaming solutions, encouraging students to pursue related topics in their theses. - Equip educators with modular, interdisciplinary resources that are easy to integrate into existing curricula. - Build a European network of educators and stakeholders to foster collaboration and ensure the sustainability of the initiative. - Contribute to aligning academic education with the industry’s shift towards sustainability, increasing student employability.
We applied for the Greening Games project to address a critical gap in higher education: the lack of interdisciplinary teaching resources and best practices about what and how to teach green gaming in order to a) prepare students for futures sustainability-related roles in the game industry b) raise student awareness about the negative environmental impacts of the video game industry. Digital games, while often praised for their potential to inspire behavioral change and raise awareness about ecological issues, remain part of a sector that contributes to environmental harm through unsustainable production practices, high energy consumption, and hardware obsolescence. Recognizing this, we saw an opportunity to lead a collaborative effort across European higher education institutions (HEIs) to fill this gap. Despite industry leaders beginning to adopt greener practices, academic institutions have lagged in providing the knowledge and tools needed to prepare students for careers in sustainable game design and development. By initiating this project, we aimed to empower educators and students with resources and foster a new generation of professionals able to address environmental challenges through innovative gaming solutions.