Games With Impact: PlanetPlay's Q2 Highlights

• Jude Ower (Chief Strategy Officer, Lead, PlanetPlay)

At PlanetPlay, we believe games can be more than entertainment: they can be powerful tools for civic engagement, education, and climate action.

From classrooms to cityscapes, gamer surveys to policymaker roundtables, Q2 2025 has shown just how far games can go in shaping a greener, more sustainable world.

Here’s what PlanetPlay and the GREAT Project have been up to, and what’s next.

1 Million Gamers, One Shared Mission

We launched the Play2Act2 survey, reaching over 1 million gamers across Europe, gathering vital insights on sustainability, green policy, and civic action through play. Read the full case study

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Game-Based Learning in Cyprus

Through our Cyprus classroom case study, students explored the Sustainable Development Goals via educational gameplay, sparking conversation, understanding, and real-world learning outcomes. Read the full case study

Green Jobs: Games Empowering Youth

Our Green Jobs pilot gave young people the chance to shape policy through interactive, gamified tools, offering a blueprint for civic participation via games. Read the Green Jobs report

Greener Cities Through Play

We wrapped our Green Roofs simulation study, using games to help players explore nature-based solutions and urban sustainability from a playful perspective. Explore the report

Connecting Projects Across Europe

In June, we joined 12 other Horizon Europe projects at the Games for Culture Cluster meeting in Brussels, sharing ideas, research, and strategies to elevate games as drivers of cultural and ecological innovation. Event highlights

More Research That Resonates

The GREAT project is contributing to many other major academic and policy conversations, with recent publications including:

Where We’ve Been

PlanetPlay and our GREAT Project partners have been proud to represent the initiative at leading global events:

  • EU Cultural & Creative Industries Innovation Platform, Rotterdam
  • Nordic Game, Malmö
  • Games for Good Summit, New York
  • SXSW, London
  • European Green Cities Conference, Berlin
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Each of these platforms helps amplify our message: games are powerful tools for civic innovation and sustainability.

On 17 June 2025, the Games for Culture Cluster (GCC) took part in the Gaming Projects Cluster Meeting in Brussels. Representing the Games for Culture Cluster (GCC) and the MEMENTOES Project, Nikolaos Dimitriou, Stavroula Ntoa, and Christina Tsita joined the event to present and discuss shared challenges and opportunities with other gaming initiatives.

GCC members, EPIC-WE project, GAME-ER Project, #LoGaCulture, and GREAT presented their projects, highlighting objectives, current level of maturity, and recent advancements.

The meeting provided a valuable opportunity to identify new paths for collaboration, both within the cluster and across the wider network of EU-funded gaming projects.


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Looking Ahead

What’s next for GREAT and PlanetPlay?

  • Play2Act3 survey launches in Q3
  • Final project conference in the works
  • New policy recommendations whitepaper coming soon

About the GREAT Project

GREAT (Games Realising Effective and Affective Transformation) is a Horizon Europe project exploring how video games and virtual experiences can empower citizens to participate in sustainability transitions. From climate policy to green jobs and energy choices, GREAT is building serious games with serious impact. Learn more at

Learn more at www.greatproject.gg

Stay tuned as we continue turning gameplay into green progress.

And if you're a studio, researcher, or changemaker ready to collaborate, we'd love to hear from you.


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