Trash Panic

What’s the Story?

TRASH PANIC, a downloadable game available exclusively for the PlayStation 3 through the PlayStation Store, has players disposing of garbage expediantly and via environmentally friendly means when possible. Play feels vaguely like a game of Tetris, with players stacking various objects, ranging from sandwiches to playground slides, in a manner that saves as much space as possible. Once in the bin you can smash, burn, or compost the trash, depending on what it's made of and which tools you're provided. And while burning stuff is the simplest means of getting rid of large volumes of trash quickly, immolating the wrong sorts of objects releases toxic gases, which increases a player's carbon footprint and results in a lower score for that stage or mission.

Is It Any Good?

Though it can be difficult to figure out -- a quick interactive tutorial would have been preferable to the 20-page virtual manual provided -- once you've got a handle on how Trash Panic works there isn't much not to like about it. The rubbish stacking and disposal concept is exceedingly clever. In retrospect, it's rather shocking that game designers haven't previously tried to remove the abstraction from block stacking games by letting us pile up realistic objects governed by real-world physics.

And the green theme is nothing if not timely. This game has the potential to make players of all ages consider what happens to their trash after they dispose of it. And by rewarding us with "eco" points for disposing of garbage safely and punishing us with "ego" points for doing it in an ecologically unsound manner, the game instills in players a basic desire to ensure that our trash is properly handled. If even a tiny bit of that desire is carried into our everyday lives, then Trash Panic will have acted as a positive environmental influence -- no small feat for a video game.