Terraforming - the act of changing a planet's environment to make it more amenable to Earth-based life - is a sci-fi technology that's becoming more realistic with each passing year. While it's typically presented as a means of making other planets (usually Mars) habitable for humans, the concept is also being applied in reclaiming land here at home as climate change alters Earth's landscape.
Terraforming a small region would be an incredible scientific achievement, and a whole planet would be one of humankind's greatest accomplishments if successful. These games explore terraforming on Earth and on Mars, and the challenges that go with such an undertaking.
8 Surviving Mars
Martian city-builder Surviving Mars only focuses on terraforming as a secondary objective in its sci-fi sandbox, but the climate gameplay is arguably the most in-depth and rewarding part of the game. Even reaching a single threshold like rainfall or resilient lichen is a massive investment of time and resources, and it can feel better than maintaining a stable population in the domes.
Terraforming in Surviving Mars requires the Green Planet DLC, but if you only pick up one expansion for the game, that's the one to grab.
7 Plan B: Terraform
This early-access indie title shows a ton of promise, requiring players to settle and terraform an uninhabited planet as Earth becomes unsustainable. Its hex-based city-builder gameplay requires you to lay roads and rails for expansion and travel, while planning ahead for the changing landscape of the planet.
With over a million tiles per map, Plan B: Terraform could be one of the largest-scale strategy games to date when it reaches full release in 2024. If environmental games are your jam, this is definitely one to watch.
6 Farlanders
Farlanders is a turn-based game that presents players with a small map and limited resources, requiring them to make do with what little space they have in creating a habitable Mars colony. The game's cynical, tongue-in-cheek style presents a world where Mars is being terraformed as a profit-seeking reality program. If the end result is a new home for humanity, do the ends justify the means?
Farlanders' maps and missions are deceptively tricky, and even the early stages can back you into a corner if you aren't careful. Power, water supply, and the needs of your population all need to be met turn-by-turn if you're going to succeed. Terraforming is an important tool for shaping the map to suit your needs!
5 The Planet Crafter
Another early-access title with amazing potential, The Planet Crafter puts players in charge of terraforming Mars from a first-person perspective. The enormous scale of terraformation means that a top-down perspective is usually the only way to portray it in games, but The Planet Crafter really makes the ground-level gameplay work through survival crafting mechanics.
If economy management and nitty-gritty tile placement aren't for you, this is a great way to experience the transformation of Mars into a habitable world. Watching your base transform gives the process a personal touch that's hard to replicate.
4 Terraformers
Terraformers has some 4X elements that aren't often present in terraforming games, making it unique. In addition to the usual resource management, players also send characters to explore the planet's surface, adding a personal touch to a genre that typically focuses on the big picture.
With a procedurally-generated map of Mars and a card-based project system, Terraformers offers much more replay value than many similar games. You can turn the Red Planet green over and over again!
3 Terra Nil
This recent climate puzzler is a fantastic way to relax and unwind, with a soothing soundtrack and deeply satisfying gameplay. Completing a map only takes around an hour, but in that time you get to transform a burned and barren waste into a thriving ecosystem.
Terra Nil not only highlights the effects that a few degrees of temperature can have on an environment and the amount of work it takes to correct, but it also reminds us why conservation is so important. The game even requires players to clean up after themselves, recycling all of their buildings and machinery at the end of a map to leave no trace behind.
2 Per Aspera
Per Aspera is an ambitious sci-fi story wrapped up in a planetary-scale city-builder. It does an excellent job of highlighting just how enormous a task terraforming Mars would be, with characters being born, growing up, and growing old over the course of a few hours of gameplay.
Casting players as the self-aware AI overseeing the terraformation project, Per Aspera also dives into themes of sentience and machine ethics in unexpected and exciting ways. It has by far the deepest narrative of any game on this list, so if you prefer games with a little more heart, this could be the Mars game for you.
1 Terraforming Mars
Simply put, Terraforming Mars is one of the best board games around. Whether you're playing the tabletop version or the excellent digital adaptation (which automates the scorekeeping and resource allocation, making for streamlined gameplay), it's hard to find a better blend of game mechanics and realism than this masterpiece.
The immense array of options available to players during a single game means that there are plenty of viable builds. There are also several expansions available, allowing players to manage the political factions on the Red Planet or even expand their operation to Venus!