Are you game?

The 2010 CCA Master’s Students Program, on the theme CCA Green, looks beyond typical technocratic solutions to define sustainability in social terms.

Part research, part game design, the Green CCA project is set in the context of rapidly expanding knowledge and design responses to the challenges of sustainable architecture. Rather than conducting a broad survey of sustainability, our approach focuses on singular approaches and strategies used by designers, individuals and collectives to share knowledge and become aware of one another’s contributions. One such strategy is the multiplayer game.

Scenario games, board games and playful forms of protest were the precedents for a board game of our own design. Players take turns moving their pieces along the game board, following multiple paths that trace timelines organized into sustainable thematics such as water and energy. To win the game, players gain points by completing local activities inspired by events that are distant in time or place.

Playing this game brings to light an edited sampling of our diverse research done at the CCA. Implicit in the rules and operations of the game lie our interests in feedback loops, co-authorship, the interrelations of individuals to groups, and the cognitive processes that we see as integral to living in a way that is environmentally conscious.

Jennifer Davis
University of Toronto, Canada

Alana Green
University of British Columbia, Canada

J. Alejandro Lopez Hernandez
University of Toronto, Canada