Academic conference puts board game sustainability, environmental theming and more under the microscope

An academic conference exploring everything from publishers’ environmental claims and sustainable manufacturing to Pokémon card investing and onboarding new players is set to kick off tomorrow, as researchers examine the many interpretations of this year’s theme ‘Green’.

The free online Generation Analog 2026 event has been organised by Analog Game Studies, a quarterly journal dedicated to studying games with a substantial analogue component, and Game in Lab, an academic research grant programme co-created by Asmodee in 2018.

While many of this year’s presentations explore environmental issues, the conference’s broad ‘Green’ theme also encompasses topics including newcomer experiences, representation, identity, game history and design philosophy.

All of the talks are set to be recorded and made publicly available after the event, which takes place on July 15 and 16.

Example sessions include Plastic Dystopia: Ideas towards More Sustainable Miniaturing Practices, which aims to propose new ways of minimising the ecological footprint of the hobby, and How Green Is Green Play? Gamewashing in Analog Board Games, examines what the researchers describe as “gamewashing” – where environmental themes or sustainability messaging may not be reflected by a game’s actual mechanisms or player experience.

Several sessions examine how environmental themes are represented in commercial games, while Daybreak co-designer Matteo Menapace will be providing a keynote speech discussing the Kennerspiel des Jahres-winning title and how its realistic and utopian theme can be an antidote to capitalist realism.

Elsewhere, researchers from the University of York analyse five published climate change board games, arguing that many reinforce solutions rooted in existing economic assumptions rather than encouraging players to foster deeper engagement with the colonial and capitalist roots of the climate crisis, while another presentation explores how the relations between humans and animals are depicted in Uwe Rosenberg’s design Atiwa.

The full schedule for the conference is available here, and anyone interested in registering to view the panels and keynotes can do so here.