Top five family games that can semi-legitimately be considered AutoblogGreen material

Dec 21st 2006 at 12:19PM
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Yesterday we had a post about Energy Choices, a game where students can learn about cars, fuel and carbon tax while rolling and moving pawns. This got me thinking about other AutoblogGreen-related games. It is the holidays, after all, and if board and card games are something your family enjoys when you get together, then perhaps you'd like to give these a try.
  1. Terra is a "semi-cooperative" card game where players are trying to "save the earth, nothing less." With a broad social and environmental message, Terra is not a winner-take-all type of game, but a game where there could be many winners, if common interest items like the environment are protected in the game. Of course, as the official description says, "If each player plays only in his own interest, the game is likely to end prematurely, with all players losing."
  2. If Terra sounds too tame, try 60 Minutes To Save The Earth. Another cooperative-ish game, 60 Minutes (does Andy Rooney play?) casts players in the role of industrialists who need to not only make money, but also be environmentally conscientious doing it. Once again, if the world is polluted, there is no winner.
  3. Moving on to actual car-related games, there's Street Illegal. Unfortunately, the title does not refer to a standard Escalade with a secret E85 conversion kit smuggled in from Brazil, or a ZENN car that has been modified to go 40 MPH. But, you can always imagine these illegal green cars zipping past each other in this race game for 1-7 players (yes, it can be played solitaire).
  4. When we all drive around in electric cars, we'll need to make sure the power grid is secure. If you want to test out different strategies for controlling the electric market, try the game called Power Grid (Funkenschlag in the German original). I've actually played this game a few times, and it's very good. I can't vouch for any of the other games on this list, but they do deal in some way with the environment or cars, so I'd be tempted to try them. I suggest reading more about them at Board Game Geek to see if you might like them. For an incredibly long list of environmentally-themed family games, click here.
  5. Lastly, of course, the Monopoly "Here & Now" version with a Prius for a pawn. You can read all about that here.

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