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There's certainly not an avalanche of eco games available, but if you can tear yourself away from Gears of War, there are a couple of green-themed choices. We've rounded up options for PC fans, handheld owners and the console-free crowd.
Provided your intended giftee has a Windows PC, the latest version of SimCity, SimCity Societies (pictured), is probably as good as it's gonna get. As mayor, you have the choice of picking cleaner energy over the dirtier, carbon intensive options which increase the chance of globally warmed disasters hitting your metropolis. Unfortunately, despite the eco leanings, our friends over at GameSpot UK think the £35 game is just a little "lacklustre".
For cousins addicted to their pocketable Nintendo DS, you could buy them a voucher for Eco Creatures, which goes on sale next year. The nub of the game is straightforward: save the world from ecological Armageddon.
Then, for the console-less, there's the £30 Planet Earth DVD game, which gives armchair conservationists and geographers the chance to flex their knowledge gleaned from the eponymous series.
Of course, all the Christmas gaming options use electrical juice, and on that criteria, the Nintendo Wii trumps the PS3 and Xbox 360 by using far less energy -- ten times less in the case of the electricity guzzling PS3. The flip side, though, is that Nintendo comes bottom of Greenpeace's recent general environmental impact chart and Sony comes top. Which to choose? You could always turn off at the plug and go for a walk.
19 December 2007 12:07pm
Note: Nintendo's at the bottom of that chart because they do not share some of the information required by Greenpeace about their supply chain. As a result, Greenpeace didn't actually score them (they gave them a 0).
20 December 2007 10:51am
Nintendo got 0 because it does not have a recycling policy for their old products unlike many of it's competitors and it has not publicly committed to phase out the worst toxic chemicals unlike most mobile and PC makers. The Greenpeace guide ranks companies on public policy and practice in relation to phasing out toxic chemicals and recycling old products to stem the growing tide of toxic e-waste.
On these criteria Nintendo has a lot of work to do.
Tom
Greenpeace
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