When I arrived to UNC in my freshman year, I brought a mental list: a list of things I would do to set myself up for financial success. Yet even as I worked to attain good financial literacy, I sensed that many of my peers preferred not to even think about such matters. I later realized that many people feel like they should know more 'formal' financial management (aka: beyond budgeting) by the time they're toddlers, and by the time they begin university, that it's "too late" or they're ashamed to ask "basic" questions like what is the difference between a savings account and an investment account. In this way, the very people who most need some guidance on money management may be the least likely to engage in discussions about it; I have thought a lot about the importance of overcoming this natural barrier.
This game doesn't go into too much detail about all the nitty gritty details of finances, but I aimed to cover the basics in a humorous manner to combat those feelings of shame by keeping people entertained. By the end, players should have a better understanding of how to organize their finances and have hopefully overcome the idea that finances is confusing, scary or not for them.
We used the online version of Twine (twinery.org) to build the game. The story format is the default Harlowe 3.3.4. Melissa (that's me) did all the writing, coding and art, and Ellen gave advice and worked on finishing touches (scripting, layout, the elevator pitch, as well as a lot of playtesting).
The major challenges were keeping all the edge cases accounted for. Needless to say, there are a lot of variables in play, and I haven't used Twine in a couple of years so it was a learning on the go experience. There were also some troubles getting the aesthetics correct - we received help from the mentors to find the specific Twine classes and Judy Yap was our honorary debugger :)
Finishing the game was a major accomplishment! I'm also super glad we got the background a proper tar heel blue. It was a struggle, but it was important to stick with the theme.
I learned a lot more about Twine syntax than I knew before. Also, I was reminded of important HTML/CSS coding principles and tricks.
What's next for Beat Debt: A Financial Adventure at UNC-Chapel Hill? Honestly, I would love to make it more visually interactive - more little Ramses memes! It would also be nice to go into further detail on these different areas, and maybe create some sort of interactive checklist website at the end that players can use to track their own progress.
I feel super proud of myself for what I accomplished in such a short span of time but I also think this could be expanded a lot further, and I'm very excited to see what that looks like!
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