It's not suprising that the only place you'll find a title like Endless Ocean is in the virtual realm. Endless Ocean was released last year for Nintendo Wii. In the game, players go diving to all sorts of nooks and crannies seeking wildlife and treasure (the game-makers made everything benign--you won't run out of air, get entangled in a cave dive, and even the sharks don't bite). I never thought I'd find any video game inspiring, but this one just might provoke support for the oceans among a very unlikely demographic...
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The response to Endless Ocean is pretty interesting. The hardcore gamer crowd is having a hard time figuring out just what to do with it. Here is an example. It remains to be seen whether the game will truly be embraced by gamers or gain its most significant foothold among more casual players. Because it has footholds in both markets, the Wii is definitely the right console for something like this. Unfortunately, a load of low-quality shovelware is bound to follow.
Posted by: Michael Clarkson | February 25, 2008 9:04 AM
Since you're curious about games that can reach a new audience about ocean issues you may have heard about Harpooned, a "Japanese Cetacean Research Simulator" in which whale meat is "researched" into pet food. There's an interesting article about its development and the reaction it received on Gamasutra today too. Apparently the game received a lot of attention from people who already knew about the issue, but because it got publicized on gaming outlets it also drew in a lot of guys who came for the exploding whales (see the video on Gamasutra site) and stayed to learn about the effects of Japanese whaling.
Posted by: Michael Clarkson | March 4, 2008 8:34 AM