A living ecological simulation, modeled through coherence.
The Green Equation is a small living system you act on directly. Dropping leaf litter, growing roots toward water, laying down mulch, each action moves a real instrument: coherence, thermal stress, soil vitality, biodiversity. The math runs the same way every time; the outcome rarely does.
Free. Browser-based only, nothing to install. Built to reward attention, not clicks.
The game runs on its own page.
The Green Equation runs entirely client-side in Phaser 3, no plugins, no account, no install. Drop leaf litter to build soil. Lay mulch to buy a heat-stressed tree time. Watch ten roots reach for water, one at a time, before the system can recover. Every action is visible on the instrument panel, so cause and effect never hide behind a black box.
Four states. One living system.
Balance, tended by hand
Leaf litter builds soil. Flower patches draw the living network in. Small, deliberate actions keep every instrument in a healthy range. This is the baseline the rest of the game measures itself against.
→Stress, applied directly
Trees dry out. Roots have to reach for water, one by one, before recovery is even possible. Mulch buys time. The mycelial network activates underground, working where you can't see it.
→Recovery, earned back slowly
Once a root reaches water, coherence climbs again, but only as fast as the living network can carry it. This isn't a reset; it's proof the system held under real stress.
The state nobody wants to see
When every root fails to find water and the instruments run out of room to fall, the system doesn't reset quietly. It fades to a record of what happened: the honest cost of letting the equation slip.
The HUD is the game.
- COHERENCE
Coherence dial
The single number the whole system answers to. Every other instrument feeds into it.
- THERMAL
Thermal stress
Rises through a heatwave, and only comes back down once every root has completed its reach for water.
- SOIL
Soil vitality
Moves in three visible tiers (dormant, growing, regenerating), driven by litter and mulch you place yourself.
- NETWORK
Biodiversity / living network
An orbiting read on how connected the system's parts still are to each other.
- SCORE
Eco-Score & GE Index
What you carry out of a session: a record of how well the system held together under your hand.
"Nature always wins. We only regulate, and the math follows."
How this world actually works.
The mechanics aren't decorative. The heatwave state models a real disturbance-recovery pattern: stress accumulates, roots have to individually re-establish contact with water, and the system only regains stability once every one of them has. A rough stand-in for how ecological systems actually recover from drought and thermal stress, unevenly and one pathway at a time.
The coherence dial is the game's version of ecological resilience: a single measure of how much disturbance the system can absorb before it shifts into a different, harder-to-reverse state. The mycelial network trigger nods to the real role of mycorrhizal networks in redistributing resources between plants under stress.
A full references list, matching the standard used across I Hug Trees' other ecology content, is in progress and will be linked here.
"All we can do is respond to the environment around us. Like any living system, trees either reorganize or disintegrate, there is no third option."
Grounded in science.
Scientifically grounded
Ecological states, recovery thresholds, and instrument behavior are modeled to hold up to scrutiny from people who study ecology for a living.
Legible at a glance
You don't need a biology degree to read the panel. Color, motion, and position do the explaining, so the science stays honest without becoming homework.
Nothing is destroyed
Every element in the world persists (hidden, faded, recovered), the same discipline the system itself rewards. The game and the system it simulates share one philosophy.
This is a minimum lovable product.
Not the smallest thing we could ship, the smallest thing worth playing. One scenario, four states, six live instruments, built complete enough to feel real rather than stripped down to feel minimal. What's here works end to end. What isn't here yet is a deliberate choice, not an oversight, and more states, mechanics, and scenarios will follow directly from the feedback below.
Live now
- STATES
Early Spring, Heatwave, Ecological Resilience, Collapse
The full arc a single session can move through, four states, one continuous system.
- SCENARIO
One system, built deep
A single tree-and-soil system rather than several shallow ones, no filler mechanics.
- INSTRUMENTS
Six live instruments
Coherence, Thermal Stress, Soil Vitality, Water + Light, Living Network, and Eco Score, all driven by the same math every time.
Coming next
- STATES
More states
Additional stages beyond the four live today, shaped by what players and researchers actually report.
- SCENARIOS
More scenarios
Further systems beyond this one, scoped once the first is proven, not before.
- FEEDBACK
Built from what you tell us
Every addition from here starts as an email, a Discord thread, or a feature-board vote, not a guess.
Feedback and feature requests.
Send us a note
Bug reports, balance feedback, or anything that felt off while you were playing. We read every message.
nature@ihugtrees.org →Join the Discord
A dedicated space for players and researchers to compare notes, share sessions, and flag what they're seeing.
Join on Discord →Vote on features
A running board of what to build next. Upvote the mechanics, scenarios, and instruments you want to see.
Feature board: coming soon