Integrating Climate Change Mechanics Into a Common Pool Resource Game

Thomas J. Fennewald and Brent Kievit-Kylar

Simulation & Gaming, 2013, vol. 44, issue 2-3, 427-451

Abstract: The topic of climate change offers unique challenges to simulation game designers largely because standard game mechanics fail to capture the complexity of this real-world problem. Climate change dynamics are characterized by the second-order delayed effects of carbon emissions on global temperatures and by political actors, who often have unique individual goals and asymmetrical abilities. However, many climate change games exhibit mechanics such as immediate and first-order delayed effects, zero-sum collaborative play, zero-sum competitive play, and players with symmetrical abilities and goals. By examining variants of an asymmetrical three-player common pool resource game, this research illustrates how inclusion or omission of mechanics found in real-life climate change impact the outcome of simulations and gameplay.

Keywords: asymmetric gameplay; carbon emissions; climate change; collaborative game; common pool resource; competitive game; cooperative game; delayed effects; feedback loops; global warming; independent goals; nonzero sum game; resource management; role-playing game; second-order delayed effects; social dilemma; tragedy of the commons (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1046878112467618 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:simgam:v:44:y:2013:i:2-3:p:427-451

DOI: 10.1177/1046878112467618

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Simulation & Gaming
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().