uFin: The Challenge

A futuristic thriller for employees in banking and finance

uFin: The Challenge is a combined survey and training game for students and employees working in the financial sector. It is in active development and used in ongoing studies by M. Christen, C. Tanner, D. Schmocker and J. Katsarov at the University of Zurich (Center of Ethics and Department of Banking and Finance) and the Zeppelin Institute Friedrichshafen (Economic Psychology and Leadership).

The game offers more immersion than a normal survey or training workshop, which improves learning results due to a deeper, lasting experience. It also offers a way to specifically prime the players and test various settings and their influence on player behaviour. More specifically, there is a game version in which the setting is very warm and kind and another version in which the atmosphere is a bit cold and factual. One of the research goals is to determine how the player gets influenced by this warm or cold environment. It requires only one click in the game settings to change the setting (the story remains the same), but it would be very time-consuming to do this research with the conventional tools, which makes this game an ideal tool for research, since it offers more adaptability for research than the usually employed surveys and seminars.

In the game, the player takes up the role of a company investigator. Their task is to find out why a subsidiary company of a bank is not making any financial progress. The player has to collect any clues that are important for a potential restructuring progress. They will be confronted with different personal and business problems while finding out what is happening. Depending on what is discovered and which clues are brought back to the holding company, the player will get feedback on what the final restructuring process will change and how well the problems have been addressed.