Charity mobile game hopes to rescue gorillas from extinction

It's fair to say that gorillas haven't been very accurately represented in video games over the years. If these noble animals aren't throwing flaming barrels down scaffolds to stymie heroic plumbers, they're tossing their friends at snakes and tumbling about without a care in the world. It ain't right.

Thankfully, animal rights campaign group Flora and Fauna Internation (FFI) has resolved to set the record straight with Silverback, a mobile game based on the travails of being a gorilla in northern Rwanda's Virunga National Park.

"We had to make sure the game was rooted in some kind of reality," designer Ken Banks told BBC World Service's Digital Planet programme. "We didn't want a Donkey Kong style game, or a game where gorillas are chasing people or doing bad things."

Instead, it's all about survival against harsh odds.

"In the first level […] you are lost, you have to find your family and make your way back. Then on subsequent levels you have to fend off rival silverbacks, find yourself a mate, start your own family, lead them to safety, avoid poachers and snares.

"We try to lead people through the life of a mountain gorilla to give them a sense of the challenges they face both naturally and through human threat."

All worthiness aside, it actually sounds like a reasonably varied and enjoyable game. It was originally released in 2003, but this version is revised and available for free (with a suggested donation of £5) here.