Digital Footprint

Learning goal

Every decision made online leaves a trace, and every action produces some reaction. That is what the five phases are for: a choice made in one of them is still readable in the next, and the Phase III wrap-up says it outright, "Every post, conversation, or choice adds to your digital footprint, and now, you know how to make it work for you, not against you." The scenarios put that into practice across manipulative accounts and friend requests, checking the address bar and the HTTPS state before paying, app permission prompts, data-harvesting quizzes and apps, weighing up misinformation, and keeping a professional online reputation.

My role

• As on every lesson, the logic, the mechanics, the scene transitions and the balancing were mine. The text and the 2D and 3D art were divided out to the rest of the team.
• Structured the five life phases (Tween to Senior) over one mechanical vocabulary: a situation resolves by picking one of three cards, while the fiction, the environment and the threat model change with every phase.
• Built the three-stat economy (Charisma, Intelligence, Athletics) as the connective tissue between otherwise standalone scenarios, then gave it consequence with stat gates: a greyed-out reply reading "[locked] You need 12 Athletics" turns a lopsided build into a door that stays shut.
• Made the end-of-phase wrap-up the assessment beat: current statistics, a named badge with its flavour text, the pointer moving along the Tween-to-Senior timeline, and three transferable tips, all in one layout reused at every phase break.
• Set the timing minigame to escalate by rule instead of by authored levels: each successful hit speeds the arrow up and shrinks the target bar, so a single mechanic produces its own failure point.

Systems I designed

• A five-act life-stage structure that reuses one mechanical vocabulary — resolving a situation by picking one of three cards — while rotating the fiction, the environment and the threat model in every phase: school forums as a tween, social networks and job hunting as a young adult, banking and tax portals as an adult, dubious links and misinformation as a senior.
• A three-stat economy (Charisma / Intelligence / Athletics) acts as connective tissue between otherwise standalone scenarios, so a choice made in an early phase is still readable in the HUD several phases later — the recorded run ends at Charisma 26, Intelligence 19, Athletics 5.
• Stat gates give that economy consequence. A groupchat reply sits greyed out under "[locked] You need 12 Athletics", so a lopsided build shows up as a door the player cannot open rather than as a number on a sheet.
• The scenario library is built on plausible distractors instead of obviously wrong answers: three tax portals differ only by URL, HTTPS state, official crest and banner styling; three friend requests differ by how familiar the nickname feels, what they ask for, and how real the profile looks.
• A badge system reads the player's behavioural pattern back to them at every phase break — Chill Cat, Footprint Guardian, Wise Elder — with five badge slots on the profile screen filling in against padlocked placeholders, so the whole arc is signalled up front.
• The wrap-up screen is the lesson's assessment and debrief beat in one: current statistics, the earned badge with its flavour text, the pointer on the Tween-to-Senior timeline, and three transferable tips, all in a fixed layout reused across every phase.
• The timing minigame escalates its own difficulty by rule rather than by authored levels: the on-screen brief promises that each successful hit speeds the arrow up and shrinks the target bar, so a single mechanic generates its own failure point.
• Ownership hooks are wrapped around the systems — a full character creator, a free-text CV form, an NPC profile browser with a "TAKE OUT" action — so the footprint being accumulated belongs to a character the player made rather than to a stock avatar.

Core mechanics

• Three-option branching choices on scripted online situations, presented as three cards under a prompt box; the chosen card resolves the scenario and can award stats.
• A three-stat character sheet (Charisma, Intelligence, Athletics) kept permanently in the HUD, with floating gain feedback such as "Intelligence +2" after a good call, and a "press C to open profile" affordance.
• Stat-gated dialogue options — the hiking reply "Let's go hiking! Fresh air and great views." is greyed out and labelled "[locked] You need 12 Athletics".
• Five-phase life progression (Phase I to V) with a per-phase percentage completion bar and a Tween / Teen / Young adult / Adult / Senior timeline marker, plus a phase overview screen with tabs for all five stages.
• End-of-phase wrap-up screens reporting current statistics, awarding a named badge with flavour text, advancing the timeline pointer and presenting three tip cards.
• Diegetic device screens staging the threats — a desktop browser for pop-up ads, phishing URLs and video feeds, a hand-held phone for permission dialogs and group chats, and the fictional beebel network for feed posts, a joinable Gaming Guild and friend requests resolved with a green tick or a red cross.
• A timing minigame with a running level counter, briefed on screen as "Press the button when the moving arrow lines up with the blue bar. Each successful hit increases the difficulty — the arrow moves faster, and the bar gets smaller."
• Authoring moments outside dialogue: a character creator with paired arrow selectors and a randomise button (gender, face, skin colour, hair, hair colour, top, bottom, shoes) and a free-text "CV: Experience and Skills" form with Name, About me, I am good at and I like to do fields.

Tracked values

• Charisma
• Intelligence
• Athletics
• Phase completion percentage (Phase I to V progress bar)
• Badges — five profile slots, shown as padlocks until earned
• Lifetime timeline position (Tween / Teen / Young adult / Adult / Senior)
• Timing minigame difficulty level (Level 7 reached in the recorded run)

Example events

• Malvertising, staged over a browser buried in pop-ups reading "GET A NEW PC" and "NEW UPDATE AVAILABLE! DOWNLOAD NOW!": "Your favorite website suddenly looks strange, with lots of ads everywhere." — leave the site right away / try refreshing or another browser / "Download something that says, 'fix the problem.'"
• Friend requests on beebel: "You get multiple friendly messages and then friend requests! Which account do you want to add?" — "BananaBoy333 — uses a nickname you recognize and posts photos of your school." / "HelpMePls — messaged you asking for your phone number and password." / "PhotoLover — posts lots of photos and talks about cameras, shows a real-looking profile."
• Paying property tax online after buying a first house — three portals separated only by their address bar: "www.gov-taxes.eu/house – clean layout, HTTPS, official crest, login via e-identification." / "www.house-tax.online – looks real, but address bar says 'Not Secure'." / "www.housetax-fastpay.net – flashy 'Pay Now!' banner, no government logo."
• An app permission prompt rendered inside the phone itself: "Banking App wants access to your fingerprint/face ID for login." with a DENY / ALLOW dialog on the handset and matching Deny / Allow choice cards below it.
• A stat-gated social vote: "We're voting where to go on Saturday! Hiking, or karaoke! What's your pick?" — the hiking reply is closed off with "[locked] You need 12 Athletics", leaving the karaoke answers open.
• A data-harvesting quiz in the senior phase: "Your grandson sends a link to a 'Which celebrity are you?' quiz. He says to look at it!" — "I filled it in already! It asked for my birthday and phone number..." / "That looks fun, but those quizzes often collect personal data. Let's find a safe one together!" / try it later out of curiosity.