How we made a children's educational web game for the Bank of Russia

about the project



We have made a game that simply and interestingly tells children about financial literacy. The game teaches schoolchildren to manage their savings wisely - to understand financial products and services, to avoid scammers.



Children face serious financial threats as much as adults. Many schoolchildren have savings, they use bank cards and make purchases on the Internet.



But ordinary teaching materials are too complex and boring to attract attention and introduce students to basic financial terms. Therefore, together with the Central Bank, we have created a vivid educational game.



Watch a short teaser





About client



The Central Bank of the Russian Federation is the main first-tier bank that is responsible for the efficiency of the country's financial system. The central bank issues money, regulates financial institutions, and protects the rights of their clients.



Result



The game has become a part of a large educational project of the Bank of Russia. It is played by children and adults from different cities of Russia.



  • 23,000 people played the game
  • 16 minutes average game time
  • 40% played more than once


We conducted an advertising campaign among VKontakte users.



  • 2 247 746 user coverage
  • 8,173 clicks on posts


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What have we done



Study



We needed to immerse ourselves in the students' experience. Therefore, we interviewed children between the ages of 10 and 17 and learned about their experiences with money and their play preferences. Figured out what they associate with financial terms.



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Thanks to the research, it became clear to us what threats should be discussed in the game and what advice to give children. We found out the interests of the target audience and chose the genre - a classic platformer with several levels. They came up with the characters of the game, which would be associated by children with financial terms and threats.



Concept



Children love stories about magic and miracles, so we made financial terms a part of the fairytale plot.



The main characters are the boy Vanya and his sister Polina.



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They save money for a gift for their mom. But the piggy bank with all the savings is kidnapped by an evil wizard. Children chase the villain into a magical world full of trials and traps



Illustrations



Simultaneously with the creation of the plot, we began drawing the characters of the game world: the main characters, assistants and villains.



First we drew sketches by hand and chose the images. After that, they created color models and started prototyping the game levels.



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Prototypes



It was important for us to make the game simple and interesting at the same time. Therefore, we ran the first tests before starting programming. Collected paper level prototypes and placed obstacles and tips on them.



Animation



To bring the characters and the game world to life, we used sprite animation. Each sprite is a specific movement, jump or step. For the smooth animation of the main characters, we needed 30 sprites and another 40 to create a living game world.







Hero stories



The story of Vanya and Polina is told in five cutscenes between the game levels. We made a video in the style of classic comics, with minimalistic animation and a voiceover from the narrator.







Landing page



The game was posted on the website of the educational project of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation . For the landing page we developed a design with game illustrations. We launched an advertising campaign on VKontakte to attract the target audience.



We received awards for this project



  • Tagline Awards 2019. Gold for Best Mobile Game;
  • Tagline Awards 2019. Bronze in the Best Campaign for a Financial / Insurance Organization nomination;
  • Tagline Awards 2019. Bronze in the category "Best Music / Sound Design (Craft)"
  • Digital Communications AWARDS 2020. Laureate in the category "Digital Media & Tools / Corporate Digital Game"



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