Die Gute Fabrik and the necessity to tackle climate inaction
Die Gute Fabrik's Saltsea Chronicles is a story that documents the catastrophic consequences of climate change.
The game takes place generations after sea levels have risen, focusing on how communities rebuild and survive a flooded world.
It was only fitting, then, for the Danish developer to publish a report alongside the release of its latest title, sharing its carbon impact during development, from January 2020 to the launch of Saltsea Chronicles this October.
Die Gute Fabrik CEO Hannah Nicklin partnered with Benjamin Abraham, founder of environmental advocacy and consultancy firm AfterClimate, to commission the report.
As a single-project studio, the emissions produced by the game's development "are in effect the emissions of the studio, taken as a snapshot over the past three and a half years," Nicklin tells GamesIndustry.biz.
The report estimated that the studio produced just over 47 tonnes of CO2 making Saltsea Chronicles – approximately 0.000058% of what big games firms acknowledged emitting last year.
"The AfterClimate net zero snapshot collected disclosures of over 80 million tonnes of CO2 from just the biggest games companies," Abraham tells us. "We also don't know how many indie studios there are, how big they are, or where they are in the world – we really need a revolution in emissions disclosures and attitudes toward sustainability in games."
For Die Gute Fabrik, most of its emissions (15.7 tonnes of CO2) came from international flights to attend events like GDC last year, in addition to Melbourne International Games Week and SXSW Sydney earlier this month.
"While the impact of Die Gute Fabrik's direct footprint is tiny, especially when compared to AAA games, there are so many games being made now
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