Life and Taxes

A fun budgeting game that teaches players to balance saving money with keeping their joy meter alive. Make life choices, face events, and learn smart financial habits through simple gameplay.

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Inspiration

Our team was split between wanting to build a fun game and wanting to create something meaningful. Something that teaches a lesson or tackles a real problem. We compromised by creating a budgeting game that teaches the importance of saving money while also maintaining personal happiness through the Joy Meter. If the joy meter reaches zero, it's game over.

What it does

Our project is the early framework of a life-simulation budgeting game. Players make choices that affect both their money and joy, teaching basic budgeting concepts in a fun, interactive way.

How I built it

We built this project using React, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
Our team divided the work as follows:

  • One member created the pixel art assets and worked on frontend design
  • One member wrote all the life events
  • One member was the main backend developer
  • One member filled in gaps and helped wherever needed

Challenges I ran into

It was difficult to get started due to unfamiliarity with React and several bugs early on. The short time frame added pressure, but with help from mentors, we were able to complete the core skeleton of the game.

Accomplishments that I'm proud of

We are proud of the idea itself, even though we couldn’t finish every feature. We also grew a lot individually, learning new skills and realizing that the full vision of the game would require far more than 18 hours.

What I learned

We learned how to use React, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript to create a functioning program and a clean website. These skills will help us in future personal projects.

What's next for Life and Taxes

We plan to continue building the features we didn't have time to implement, including:

  • Life expectancy and aging
  • Random events
  • Different jobs with different salaries
  • More complex decision paths
  • Multiple endings
  • Additional gameplay systems

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