what is this game about?

Biome Evolver is more than a game — it’s a tool for transformation. This is climate education that actually works. Instead of doom and gloom, you experience hope. Instead of individual guilt, you discover collective power. Instead of Western-only solutions, you wield the sophisticated wisdom of indigenous communities who’ve been climate experts for millennia.

Climate education ignores the human story. Most environmental games treat climate change as purely technical, missing three critical gaps:

• Cultural Erasure: Indigenous knowledge dismissed as “folklore” rather than sophisticated science
• Justice Blindness: Focus on carbon cycles, not on who’s most affected by climate change
• Individual Focus: Emphasis on personal actions while ignoring systemic inequities and community solutions

Biome Evolver bridges these gaps through Ubuntu philosophy: “I am because we are.”

Players experience that environmental health and social equity are inseparable. Traditional knowledge is presented as proven technology. Individual success means nothing without collective well-being. Real climate solutions require justice-centered thinking.

Biome Evolver teaches that environmental sustainability and social equity aren’t competing priorities but interconnected necessities. Players experience how traditional knowledge offers sophisticated solutions to contemporary challenges.

In a world where climate education often leaves people feeling helpless, Biome Evolver offers hope through agency, wisdom through experience, and solutions through Ubuntu solidarity.

Team members: Melubuhle Gula-Ndebele, Philadelphia Makwakwa, Aneeqa Martinson (with contributions from Mamello Raboroko)

gameplay description

Players manage South African biomes (Fynbos, Grassland, Savanna, Coastal) using traditional knowledge while facing climate challenges. Success requires balancing three pillars: Equity (social justice), Economy (sustainable livelihoods), and Ecology (environmental health).

• Core Ubuntu Principle: Every decision reflects “I am because we are” — hoarding resources, ignoring environmental health, or individual achievement without community consideration leads to penalties.
• Strategic Learning: Players face real climate justice dilemmas through event cards like “Floods Hit Informal Settlements” where impacts vary based on resource equity. The game teaches through consequences, not lectures.

game features

• Authentic Cultural Integration: Ubuntu recipes based on real practices: rooibos harvesting, fire management, traditional agriculture
• Real Climate Justice Scenarios: Event cards mirror actual issues
• Ubuntu-Driven Mechanics: Community consequences for individual actions built into every system
• Educational Depth Without Preaching: Players discover principles through experience
• Community Impact: Proceeds support indigenous education

printing instructions

You can download zip file with all the material needed to be printed for the game here. There will be an instruction manual with the printable material explaining how to set up game and what to print