#2953
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I was filling in a survey from Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment of Finland, and a thought occurred to me: what if the immigration process was presented as a game?
One of the topics of the survey is difficulties of finding information and understanding in what order you need to do things when moving to Finland. There are certain things that are required for everyone, and there are also things, that vary depending on individual's situation. Isn't that like a branching quest line in an RPG or a visual novel? Or maybe a visual novel with RPG elements.
Think about it: basic information, that you need to provide when immigrating (anywhere, not just Finland) can be treated as "character creation". Who are you, where you are coming from, why you are moving, your goals for the future - that's a character sheet or "origin". In a lot of RPGs, for example in Cyberpunk 2077, your "origin" affects what other characters say (including what questions they ask), and sometimes - what quests are available to you. Me migrating for a job, for example, would trigger "a quest", which will be completed by me providing the contract. And if I am moving because of my spouse - proof of the relationship.
What if all of the bureaucracy around immigration process was an interactive visual novel? And not just for funsies, but also to actually collect all required documents in a "one-window" style? You talk with various characters, answering questions, submitting documents, but at the backend - all this information is submitted to relevant organizations: Migri, Kela, Poliisi... Heck, maybe even the bank of your choice. And you, of course, have a journal, that allows you to track status of all your "quests".
Not like this would solve all issues related to immigration, but it could work quite well with this "points" system, for sure. I mean, "points" are essential part of RPGs. You can even potentially add stuff for after immigration. Something to help with integration, with answering common questions and solving common problems (not too dissimilar to a concept I had for Smartly onboarding). There could be questlines "I lost my job", "I need pipes to be fixed", "I feel sick", "I want to start my business". Or...
Or... Just imagine this: "I want to learn Finnish". And you actually provide training materials and ways to find teachers (whether through integration courses or otherwise) right there inside the game. Just mind blowing 🤯. Maybe then integration courses will start to make sense not only for spouses, but also for specialists, that came to Finland. Or, at least, if done right.
Science has already shown, that gamification helps with lots of stuff. Why not gamify this kind of interactions with government bodies or organizations closely integrated with them? It would be required to actively maintain the thing, though, and have someone alive be ready to support, though. Chatbots can help, but as I explain in SupOps, there needs to be a person who can relay feedback, including suggestions for new questlines or additional questions in some of existing quests.
This can also help with analysis of pain-points for people, and with statistics. You can (and probably should) track user interactions, which answers are selected, how often, which pages result in frequent chats with support, etc. That data can help you find ways to improve not only this gamified system, but processes overall. Which is something that we need. I mean, quite a few politicians spout various claims without any supporting data, and often times collecting that is not just expensive, but also difficult for other reasons. This gamified experience will not provide you will all the data, of course, but it can provide you with some, and that's better than nothing.
But realistically, this is unlikely to happen, unless there is some huge support from the people, and even then it would be tentative. Government is trying to cut costs at everything that is somewhat social-related or community-centered, or, at least, that's my current perception based on what news reach me. Building a game would cost money, and if it is do be done correctly and smartly - it will probably cost more than some plain-text survey calculating an immigrant's score. I would not mind participating in the project, though, if it somehow gets approved.
