Turning GTA Online into the most immersive climate change simulator ever, Greenpeace made people interact with climate-related hazards in an unprecedented way.

As Los Santos is a perfect replica of Los Angeles, all development was guided by real predictions. Together, developers and Greenpeace scientific team redesigned the entire game experience through the open-source code of GTA.

Living the real climate effects, the gaming community was more engaged and inspired to act than ever. To make it simple, Greenpeace created an innovative way to sign their petition and donate without interrupting the immersive experience. It became an interactive in-game feature.

Greenpeace needed to engage young people to join the fight against climate change. They aren't only the most threatened, but also who can change the future.

To make them act, the first challenge was to make them realize climate-related hazards. After that, Greenpeace needed to turn this Gen Z awareness into action: engagement with the cause, petition signatures, and donations.

Beyond those tangible goals, every Greenpeace action always needs to respect brand values and refresh its 51 years brand.

As this Gen Z wasn’t connected with traditional media, Greenpeace had to find a way to truly connect with this targeted audience.

Of course, preserving their budget, because all of their investment has been used to help thousands of Brazilian families affected by flooding in 2021 and 2022.

For this, they needed something that media, inspiring influencers, and the target audience want to talk about, share, and engage with voluntarily.

In partnership with their own scientific team, Greenpeace used real scientific predictions to turn GTA Online into the most immersive climate change simulator ever.

Los Santos +3°C is an entire metaverse half-underwater, afflicted by heat, drought, air pollution, and a full-blown economic crisis, with climate refugees and many other real challenges. It also has exclusive missions, a full-scale radio station, futuristic ads and more. Everything was based on real scientific predictions.

Beyond awareness, this virtual experience also had a direct impact on the real world. Using an innovative in-game feature, gamers were able to sign the “Climate Emergency” petition and donate to Greenpeace.

Without interruption, they can act while playing. That was game-changing for the gamers community.

To reach the community, Greenpeace invited top Brazilian streamers to broadcast Los Santos +3°C on Twitch. Voluntarily, they become brand ambassadors, engaging their millions of followers to play, stream and fight climate change.

In Brazil, young people's free time is spent online. It's the 6º country with more daily average time of gameplay. According to Twitter, 80% of local subscribers are gamers. Guess what? 50% of local Gen Z (51 million) already thought about streaming their gameplay.

Of course, Twitch is a huge success here with +15 million daily users (73% between 16 and 34 years). A great path for Greenpeace.

GTA Online has another key point. Brazil is the 3° country with more players. On local Twitch, it is always on Top 3. The relationship between the community and Los Santos is unaccountable. Gamers also developed something called “Roleplays”, where avatars live like real people. Really immersive storytelling. They have jobs, family, history, housing, and more.

With the immersive experience and Twitch streamers, Greenpeace engaged the target audience by storm, leading to a huge raising of signatures on the petition and donations.

The main strategy of Los Santos +3°C was to connect with Gen Z in a way that impacts, engages and makes them act.

The gaming world is a great place for this. With the possibility to change the entire realistic simulator of GTA Online, it became perfect.

The development started with the Greenpeace scientific team. They traced all consequences of 3-degree warming in Los Angeles and those predictions guided the four months of modding by the developers.

It included thousands of new objects, hundreds of NPCs, custom artworks, affected tourist spots, missions with many tasks, a full-scale radio, futuristic OOHs, uncountable exclusive scenes and a direct in-game way to sign Greenpeace’s petition and donate.

To launch this unprecedented experience, Greenpeace invited local top streamers to broadcast it live on Twitch. The communication was done with a trailer that made the gaming community crazy and this also generated global PR.

340% increase in “Climate Emergency” petition signatures.

40% increase in donations for Greenpeace.

More than 30 million in earned media.

During the launching week, more than 450h live broadcasting by streamers on Twitch.

Approximately 8 million minutes of climate change immersive experience watched by the target.

During the first days, one in three gamers who interacted with the in-game access to the petition had signed it.

An unprecedented behavior change: GTA live streams become an educational tool.

Greenpeace's investment was zero: they were designating most of their budget to help Brazilian families affected by recent floods, because of the lack of Governmental support.

Disclaim: The most important KPI was the petition signatures. This petition demands Brazilian politicians of estates that had been impacted by climate-related hazards to declare a climate emergency. As a consequence, they will be obligated to create special planning for adaptation, impact reduction, and early warning.