The tremendous growth in the serious games market presents the opportunity to help people learn through playing games. Defying Disaster is a 2D side scroller serious game designed to teach people how to prepare for and handle an earthquake. Players do a series of mini games that provide earthquake survival tips while interacting with a larger world after an earthquake disaster. An evaluation with thirty people compared learning disaster knowledge through reading materials versus playing games. The results show people learn better through playing Defying Disaster than reading materials.