WILDLIFE THREATS RESEARCH
Tuesday, November 12th
To start this research, I decided to look at what are the biggest threats to wildlife:
Climate Chaos
“The impacts of climate change aren’t showing signs of slowing, and this administration refuses to recognize it,” says Charise Johnson of the Union of Concerned Scientists. “Water temperatures are rising, increased flooding, deforestation, fires, storms—these are all things that affect a species’ existence.”
And new threats continue to emerge. “There’s been a lot of discussion about how global climate change affects ocean acidification, and now there’s emerging evidence that the even greater threat is reduced oxygen levels,” says noted conservationist William Laurance of James Cook University. A study published last month found that ocean deoxygenation could have a major impact on zooplankton, one of the building blocks for the ocean food web.
This could be a really good idea and question to raise in our game. We always hear about issues that have been happening for a long time, such as deforestation, but we should also raise awareness about the new issues, such as the latter described above. Plus, if underwater life is endangered as an effect of climate change, that will make theses animals more valuable and hence, prone to wildlife trafficking. Maybe we could show this vicious never ending circle in our game.
"The more we know about exactly how climate change threatens certain species—or about how they can adapt to it—the better we can do at protecting them from extinction."
I think this is entirely true, and our game should 100% portray this. Raising awareness about a cause is the only way to solve it. I'm glad to see people are of the same opinion as us.
Politics
“The new president in Brazil could unravel 50 years of progress for species, tropical forests and indigenous people,” says Lindsay Renick Mayer, associate director of communications for Global Wildlife Conservation. That could be devastating to one of the world’s most biodiverse regions on the planet, which is often referred to as the “lungs of the Earth.”
Before I did some research in this subject, I had no idea about this issue and haven't really considered politics as a threat to wildlife. Now that I thought about it, it's very obvious that politics and a good administration should take care of our forests and wildlife. Maybe we could use some of this information as things to flavour our game. Maybe some signs or posters that show a bad administration campaign.
“I think our current administration has shown that the environment and conservation are not high priorities,”. There’s a potential positive side to this, she adds: “I have heard, however, that historically this produces increased donations to NGOs and increased activism by citizens.”
While I believe the administration should make wildlife conservation a high priority, the people should be involved anyway. And calling out the bad administration in our game might, maybe, be the way to open people's eyes to this issue. Like a wake up call.
Road and Infrastructure Projects
Proliferation of illegal roads is being constructed around the world by loggers, miners, poachers and other extractive industries. These activities threaten everything from elephants and tigers to insects and rare plants.
One big problem is that conservationists don’t always know where these roads—legal or otherwise—are being built, and without that information it’s impossible to protect species from development.
I find this terribly scary. In the 21st century, people are still this ignorant to the other species. I don't know if we could implement this within the current game idea, but maybe it would be worth trying to build a platform where people can share where they see roads being built. This way, it would be easier for conservationists to research and do their job better, without having to spend weeks trying to trace roads by satellites.
Diseases
"Meanwhile many experts also expressed fear about emerging diseases, like those affecting bats, frogs and salamanders.
“Emerging diseases are increasing in numbers, impacts, and in incidents, and are likely to cause greater losses of species,” says Lips. “They don’t often get the attention that climate change does, and the time scale is accelerated.”
Lips also noted that it’s often hard to get funding and other support for these growing problems because they’re less in the public eye. “People and the media tend to focus on the current emergencies rather than the slow, long-term problems because we are not very good at maintaining focus and attention,” she says.
I find this true, and I believe we shouldn't let what media tells us be all we care about. We should do more research and be more interested in such less-known issues that are affecting our wildlife. I'd like to, if possible, include a number of these in the game, whether this will be through the animals that we choose to represent the problems, or the problems themselves.
“I don’t want to sound too bleak, but time is literally running out for the world as we know it,” say TRAFFIC’s Thomas. “The Earth simply can’t take the punishment of relentless over-exploitation of its natural resources, poisoning of its atmosphere and pollution of its oceans. We need to put aside political differences and work together to do something about this catastrophic situation — and quickly.”
This is why we need the game to be as straight-forward as can be. We need to wake people up and draw their attention to the real issues, not celebrity scandals.
Source: Platt, 2019
To research forward, I decided to have a look at how animals are labelled as endangered. As I saw above, we have to make sure we raise awareness about all issues, not only some of that, so I'm trying to expand the area I'm researching as much as I can. I found this very useful chart (pictured below) and, as we are also restricted by time, I decided to randomly pick three animals/birds from each one of the Threatened categories: Critically Endangered, Endangered and Vulnerable, and then find some interesting facts that could help us come up with interesting and meaningful mechanics.
VULNERABLE SPECIES
Polar Bear - interesting enough, we always hear about the polar bears being threatened by climate change, and yet, the species is only considered vulnerable at this point. There are so many species that could disappear before, but people are not aware about that.
Anyway, I think the Still Hunting would be a good mechanic, having to wait patiently for an event to happen. Although I don't know how that would fit with a continuous running game.
The rudder thing is also interesting, having to control or balance something from behind, rather than front.
The mercury pollution we could use as an indirect threat, maybe something that accumulates across the game and you can only see the effects of it at the end of the game.
Philippine Eagle-Owl - the fact that they only hunt at dusk could be interesting mechanic, only being able to eat at sunrise is a restriction that can affect gameplay. From a animal forced migration point of view, we could later use that as an unusual thing. After player learn they can only get food during dusk, they will soon realise they have to adapt to a new environment.
Another mechanic we could have is directional hearing. It would be interesting to play with that and see how the player would respond to sound pollution, maybe.
Black Spider Monkey - one thing I noticed from the beginning was how gracefully this animal is. This could indeed help us if we decided to make an aesthetic game. Also, the fact that they spend most time aloft, and almost never come to ground, could help us in, again, getting the player used to - you are not allowed to fall off the tree, otherwise you'll die, and then later in the game, make them have to come off, to survive, making them uncomfortable.
The Black Spider Monkey's defence mechanism is also interesting. Maybe we could use that to draw the player's attention to how few these defences the monkeys have are: give them less and less trees/branches, as deforestation happens in the background.
ENDANGERED SPECIES
Black-Footed Ferret - The Weasel War Dance could be a good mechanic, a defence mechanic, where the player has to perform a set of actions in order to try and escape a life-threatening situation, be it predators, or animals. The fact that they are playful could be also helpful, in that this could get them in trouble.
The fact that, as the Philippine Eagle-Owl, they hunt at dawn could help us design a game and make the mechanics easier to learn for the player. We could use the same uncomfortable mechanic to portray migration and the difficulties encountered by getting out of your comfort zone.
Galapagos Penguin - I never realised there could be penguins in the northern hemisphere. And they are endangered... The contrast between the speed when they are on land versus underwater is nice to think of. The most basic mechanic we could come up with from this would be changing environments to avoid threats (land to water), or being forced to change environments, from a bad situation, to worse (water to land), as your abilities are restricting you.
The fact that they live in caves and crevices could also be useful, not only aesthetically, but also because it would give for nice terrain opportunities: penguins waddling in tunnels and trying to jump over obstacles could be quite fun.
Green Sea Turtle - I didn't realise turtles swim that much, thousands of mile, but if we maybe add a time limit on that, it could make for an interesting challenge for the player. Maybe while they are swimming, they also have to eat, and because of the time limit, they wouldn't have time to stop and examine the food, ending up eating plastic bags instead if jellyfish. This is quite blunt, but if that's what people need to wake up and start wasting plastic, I am ready take that into the game.
It's also interesting how these turtles go to the land to warm themselves. This could be useful in the game, a need to get out of the water. After they do, maybe the water level drops, and they find themselves far from water, being burnt by the sun.
CRITICALLY ENDANGERED SPECIES
Amur Leopard - This species is also active at dusk and dawn. It could be interesting if all animals we choose have this ability/necessity to hunt when the sun is rising/setting. To not make the mechanic boring, however, we could have small differences: here, for example, the leopard has much better night vision than daytime. Maybe it will be more efficient at the beginning of dawn, and at the end of dusk.
The humans being their only predator could help us make a direct link. Maybe this wouldn't be liked by the players, but it's the truth. And if they don't like it, they should do something to stop it.
The Amur Leopard's jump height is also a plus, we could use that for interesting mechanics.
Black Rhino - I find their ability to change skin colour to the colour of the soil very interesting. We could use this as a camouflage/hiding from predators mechanic. Kind of like a lizard. That would be quite unique. However, can they change colour to new soils, where they are not used to living? Or an environment change would put them in great danger?
The prehensile lip could also be useful. Maybe they need to grab fallen branches from their way to keep running, or feed themselves.
Their eyesight would give for an unpredictable mechanic. While say, they know the environment of a Savannah, being forced to migrate to a forest would be really hard for them, having little vision to relay on. Maybe this would give us an opportunity to implement sound as a mechanic, and a more immersive experience.
Saola - The Saola usually travels alone, but what if there were a dozen Saolas that had to help each other migrate? Would they know how to behave and do this, or will they fall apart? Maybe you are only controlling one Saola, but to jump over cliffs, you need other Saolas, to jump on to, like the mechanic this whole game idea started from. If you get lost from the group, it's unlikely for you to be able to finish the game safe.
Their horns position is quite unique, which would give us a number of possibilities to develop a unique defence mechanic, although their are just as many restraints to this position.
